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MEMOIRS  OF  THE  LIFE  OF  THE  RIGHT 
HONORABLE  RICHARD  BRINSLEY  SHERI- 
DAN. By  Thomas  Moore.  Two  volumes  in 
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SKETCHES  OF  THE  IRISH  BAR.  By  the 
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JOHN  PHILPOT  CURRAN,  late  Master  of  the 
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SKETCHES 


OF- 


The  Irish  Bar. 


by  THE 

RT.  HON.  RICHARD  LALOR  SHIEL,  M.  Pv 

WITH  MEMOIR  AND  NOTES 

—BY— 

R.  SHELTON    MACKENZIE,  D.  C.  L 


TWO  VOLUMES    I  IT    OITE. 


CHICAGO: 
Belford,  Clarke  &  Co. 

ST.  LOUIS: 

Belford    &    Clarke    Publishing    Co. 

MDCCCiXXXII. 


COPYRIGHTED. 

ELFORD,   CLARKE  &   CO., 

1880. 


PRINTED  AND   BOUND 

BY 

DONOIIUE  &  HENNEBERRY, 

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CONTENTS  OF  VOL.  I. 


Memoir  of  Mr.  Sheil page       5 

Author's  Introduction 17 

AN  IRISH  CIRCUIT. 
Going  Circuit. —  The   South  of  Ireland. —  Rules  of  Legal  Travelling.— 
An  Approver. —  Lord  Avonmore. — An  Irish  Assize  Town. —  Larry  Cro- 
nan's  Trial. —  O'Connell's  Success  with  Juries. — Trial  of  John  Scanlan 
for  Murder. —  Was  he  executed  ? 19 

HALL  OF  THE  FOUR  COURTS,  DUBLIN. 
O'Connell,  Bushe,  Lord  Plunket,  and  H.  D.  Grady. —  Curran. —  Lord  Clare. 

—  Serving  Writs  in  Connaught 58 

DANIEL  O'CONNELL. 

In  his  Study,  in  the  Four  Courts,  at  a  Popular  Meeting,  at  a  Public  Din- 
ner.—  His  Pei'sonal  Appearance. —  Merits  as  a  Nisi-Prius,  and  Ci;own 
Lawyer. —  Influence  with  Juries.  —  As  Catholic  Leader. —  Duel  with 
D'Esterre. —  On  Circuit. —  In  Parliament 73 

LORD  PLUNKET. 

His  Origin. —  Conviction  of  the  Sheareses. —  Trial  of  Robert  Emmett. —  Hiq 
Intellectual  Supremacy. —  Style  of  his  Oratory. —  Personal  Appearance. 

—  In    Parliament. —  His    Catholic   Politics. —  Grattan. —  Raised   to   the 
Bench. —  Appointed  Lord-Chancellor. —  His  Enforced  Resignation.  ...     98 

CHIEF-JUSTICE  BUSHE. 

Descent. —  The  Historical  Society. — An  Anti-Unionist. —  Solicitor-General. 

—  Catholic  Board. —  Aspect,  Voice    and  Gesture,  as  an   Orator. —  His 
Conversation,  Wit,  and  Eloquence. —  Is  made  Chief- Justice 121 

ATTORNEY-GENERAL  SAURIN. 

Huguenot  Descent. —  Lord  Clonmel. —  Business  Hahits. —  Opposes  the 
Union. — As  Attorney-General. — Anti-Catholic  Politics. —  Loss  of  Office. 

—  Deportment  and  Aspect. — Skill  as  an  Advocate.  -Distaste  for  Letters.  150 

CHIEF-BARON  JOY. 
Wij  Tory  Politics. —  Sympathy  with  Saurin. —  Bar  Advancement. —  Is  made 
Solicitor-General. —  His  Legal   and    Scientific   Attainments. —  Skill    at 
Cross-Examination, —  Character  as  a  Judge , 170 


3297 


4  CONTENTS. 

CALAMITIES  OF  THE  BAR. 
An  Unfortunate  Lawyer. —  Tragic   Scene. —  Lord   Manners. —  The  French 
Bar. —  Trippier,  the  Parisian  avocat. — The  Lawyer's  Progress. —  "  Mac- 
Dougall  of  the  Roar." — Pomposo,  a  Sketch  from  Life. —  Monks  of  the 
Screw. — Jerry  Keller. —  Norcott,  the  Renegade,  and  his  Fate 186 

CHIEF-JUSTICE  LEFROY. 
A   Saintly   Lawyer. —  O'Connell   on   Catholic   Education. —  Lefroy  in   the 
Chancery  Court. —  Captain  Rock  in  Limerick. —  Raised  to  the  Bench.  .    216 

MR.  SERGEANT  GOOLD. 

An  Amirahle  Crichton. —  Sows  his  Wild  Oats. —  Edmund  Burke. —  Goold's 
Nisi-Prius  Practice. —  His  Vanity. —  Opposes  the  Union. —  Sir  Jonah 
Barrington. —  Goold's  Election  Evidence. — Is  made  Master  in  Chancery.  232 

MR.  NORTH,  JUDGE  OF  THE  ADMIRALTY  COURT. 

Brilliant  University  Career. —  At  the  Bar. —  Irish  Eloquence. —  Compara- 
tive Failure  in  Parliament. — Neutrality  in  Politics. —  The  Bottle  Riot. .   252 

MR.  WALLACE. 

Professional  Progress. —  High  Repute  in  Jury  Cases. —  License  of  the  Bar. 

—  Catholic  Meeting. —  Grattan's  last  Pu'Klic  Appearance 269 

WEXFORD  ASSISES. 
The  Leinster  Circuit. —  Archbishop  Magee. —  Bishop  Elrington's  Anti- 
Necromantic  Movement. —  Irish  Peasant-Girls. —  A  Pic-Nic  Excursion. 
— Massacre  on  the  Old  Bridge  of  Wexford. —  O'Connell's  Triumphal 
Entry. —  Chief-Justice  Bushe  and  Judge  Johnson. —  Trial  of  Father  Car- 
roll :   Monomania 287 

CHIEF-JUSTICE  DOHERTY. 

As  an  Advocate,  and  Crown-Lawyer. —  Judges  Perrin  and  Crampton. — 
Lord-Chancellor  Manners'  Inefficiency. —  George  Canning's  Career. — 
Doherty  versus  O'Connell. —  Raised  to  the  Bench. —  Declines  a  Peerage.  311 

THE  DUBLIN  TABINET  BALL. 
''The  Liberty"  of  Dublin. —  An  American  Marchioness. —  Lord  Wellesley 
as    Bridegroon    and   Viceroy. —  Sir    Harcourt    Lees. —  "Ireland's  only 
Duke." — Lord    Edward    Fitzgerald. —  Lady    Morgan. —  The    Younger 
Grattan  —  Curran  —  "  The  Tenth."— An  Irish  Hebe 328 

CATHOLIC  LEADERS  AND  ASSOCIATIONS. 

Confederates  of  1642. —  Enactment  of  the  Penal  Laws. —  Catholic  Com- 
mittees.—  Wolfe  Tone  and  John  Keogh. —  O'Connell's  first  Appearance. 

—  Denis  Scully,  and  iEneas  M'Donnell. —  Lords  French,  Fin  gal,  and  Kil- 
leen, —  Doctor  Drumgoole. —  George  IV.  in  Ireland. —  Catholic  Associ- 
ation founded. —  Bishop  Doyle  and  the  Sorbonne  Doctors. —  Archbish- 
ops Troy,  Curtis,  and  Murray. —  Bishop  Kell/ 359 


MEMOIR    OF    MR.    SHEIL. 


Richard  Lalor  Sheil,  author  of  "  Sketches  of  the  Irish 
Bar,"  was  horn  at  Waterford,  in  Ireland,  in  the  year  1793. 
He  died  at  Florence,  where  he  was  British  Minister,  on  April 
25,  1851,  aged  fifty-eight. 

His  father,  who  had  been  a  merchant  at  Cadiz,  retired  on  a 
competence,  which  enabled  him  to  purchase  an  estate  in  the 
county  of  Waterford.  Returning  to  mercantile  pursuits,  he 
was  unfortunate,  and  died,  leaving  his  sons  little  more  than 
the  means  of  perfecting  a  liberal  education.  One  of  these  sons 
was  Colonel  Justin  Sheil,  yet  surviving,  who,  for  several  years, 
was  British  Ambassador  to  Persia. 

Like  O'Connell,  who  was  nearly  twenty  years  his  senior, 
Sheil  was  originally  intended  for  the  Catholic  Church.  At  an 
early  age,  he  was  sent  to  a  Jesuit  school  at  Kensington,  near 
London.  He  was  subsequently  removed  to  Stonyhurst,  in 
Lancashire,  whence  he  went  to  Trinity  College,  Dublin,  with 
a  competent  knowledge  of  the  classics,  some  acquaintance  with 
Italian  and  Spanish,  and  the  power  of  speaking  and  writing 
French,  as  if  it  were  his  mother-tongue.  His  taste  for  litera* 
hire  and  his  facility  for  rhetorical  composition  were  early 
developed.  In  the  University  he  won  several  classical  prizes, 
and  was  acknowledged  to  surpass  most  of  his  fellow-students 
in  general  acquirements.  He  was  a  constant  and  favorite 
speaker  in  the  celebrated  Historical  Society  (the  cradle  of 
Irish  eloquence  at  the  time),  where  the  brilliancy  and  force  of 
his    rhetoric    always    commanded    admiration    and     applause 


6  MEMOIR    OF   MR.    SHEtL. 

Then,  as  ever  after,  his  oratory  consisted  of  more  than  flowing 
sentences,  for  he  generalized  and  applied  facts,  with  rare  and 
remarkable  felicity.  He  graduated  before  he  was  twenty 
years  old,  and  his  college  comates  prophesied  that  his  career 
would  be  distinguished. 

At  this  time,  and  for  a  £ew  years  preceding,  he  floated  on 
the  surface  of  Dublin  society.  Small  in  stature,  slight  in 
figure,  and  eminently  vivacious  in  manner  and  deportment,  he 
came  into  society,  almost  a  boy  —  as  Moore  had  done,  some 
fifteen  years  earlier  —  and,  like  Moore,  he  gave  rise  to  sanguine 
anticipations.  It  was  a  doubt  whether  he  would  subside  into 
a  poet  or  an  orator,  but  every  one  saw  and  said  that  he  was 
marked  for  distinction.  There  were  great  men  in  Dublin  at 
that  time  :  Plunket,  with  unequalled  powers  of  eloquence  and 
reasoning;  Bushe,  silvery-tongued  as  Belial,  but  full  of  capti- 
vating amiability;  Goold,  imbued  with  a  charming  amour 
projyre,  which  made  you  like,  while  you  smiled  at  the  man  ; 
O'Oonnell,  in  the  full  strength  of  youth  and  power,  storming 
his  way  to  the  head  of  his  profession  ;  North,  the  college  rival 
and  friend  of  Sheil,  whose  maturity  did  not  fulfil  the  promise 
of  his  youth;  Wolfe,  afterward  Chief-Baron,  with  the  kindest 
and  truest  heart  throbbing  in  a  gnarly  case;  and  others,  more 
or  less  distinguished,  then  or  since.  At  that  time,  too,  Grattan 
and  Curran  were  the  ornaments  of  intellectual  life  in  Dublin  ; 
full  of  reminiscences  of  the  Volunteers  in  1782,  and  the  Reign 

of  Terror  in  1798. 

It  was  natural  that,  amid  such  men,  Sheil,  young,  ardent, 
and  highly-gifted,  should  set  up  a  high  standard  of  excellence, 
to  which  to  direct  his" own  ambitious  strivings;  and  that  "Ex- 
celsior" should  be  to  him,  as  to  all  who  worthily  aspire,  at 
once  a  motto  and  a  monitor. 

He  was  barely  twenty  when,  in  1813,  he  made  his  first 
plunge  into  public  and  political  life.  There  were  divisions 
among  the  Irish  Catholics  then.  One  section,  aristocratic  and 
moderate  —  who,  rather  than  the  clanking  should  offend  the 
"  ears  polite"  of  their  rulers,  would  willingly  have  wrapped 
their  fetters  in  velvet  —  desired  to  give  the  British  government 
a  Veto  on  the  appointment  of  the  Catholic  Bishops,  provided 


MEMOIR    OV    MR.    SI1EIL.  7 

that  Emancipation  were  conceded.  The  other,  democratic 
and  hold,  denounced  all  compromise.  Sheil  attached  himself 
to  the  first,  while  O'Oonnell  headed  the  latter.  Both  Tribunes 
of  the  People  were  able  and  eloquent  —  but  the  man,  O'Oon- 
nell, prevailed  over  the  boy,  Sheil,  and  the  latter  quitted  the 
field,  for  a  time. 

In  1814,  at  the  age  of  twenty-one,  Sheil  was  called  to  the 
Irish  Bar.  His  youth  was  against  him,  of  course.  His  predi- 
lections were  in  favor  of  literature,  and,  for  several  years,  his 
contributions  to  the  London  magazines  afforded  him  the 
chief  means  of  subsistence.  He  wrote  for  the  stage,  also  — 
excited  by  the  brilliant  genius  of  Miss  O'Neil,  the  Irish  trage- 
dienne—  and  his  play  of  "  Evadne"  still  retains  a  place  in 
the  acted  drama,  by  reason  of  its  declamatory  poetry  and 
effective  situations. 

On  the  Leinster  Circuit,  Mr.  Sheil  had  to  contend  (strange  as 
it  may  appear),  with  his  previous  reputation  as  an.  orator — for 
a  good  point  at  law  is  considered  better,  on  account  of  its 
weight  with  the  judge,  than  a  brilliant  speech,  intended  to 
win  the  verdict  of  a  jury.  At  the  bar,  it  must  be  confessed, 
Mr.  Sheil  never  attained  the  highest  distinction.  His  legal 
knowledge  was  limited,  as  respects  depth  and  extent.  In 
criminal  cases,  his  eloquence  often  prevailed  with  juries,  and, 
as  he  gradually  reached  seniority,  he  also  obtained  leading 
briefs  at  Nisi-Prius.  In  the  Four-Courts,  where  the  metropol- 
itan practice  takes  place,  Sheil  eventually  came  to  be  consid- 
ered a  passable  general  lawyer. 

In  1823  (as  related  by  himself  in  the  article  on  Catholic 
Leaders),  he  joined  with  O'Oonnell,  in  establishing  the  Catho- 
lic Association,  which  literally  became  a  sort  of  irnperium  in 
i?nperio  in  Ireland.  In  this  body,  both  leaders  spoke  earnestly 
and  well.  O'ConnelPs  role  was  to  insist  on  "Justice  for  Ire- 
land," SheiPs  to  cast  contempt  and  ridicule  upon  what  was 
called  Protestant  Ascendency. 

In  1825,  both  leaders  ("  Magna  comitante  oaterva"),  went  to 
London,  as  part  of  a  deputation,  at  the  time  when,  the  sup- 
pression of  the  Catholic  Association  becoming  a  government 
preliminary,  Emancipation  —  clogged   with  "the  wings/'   viz? 


S  MEMOIR   OF   MR.    SHEIL. 

disfranchisement  of  the  forty  shilling-  freeholders,  and  state* 
payment  of  the  Catholic  clergy  —  would  have  been  granted, 
but  for  a  speech  from  the  Duke  of  York,  heir-presumptive  to 
the  throne,  in  which  he  made  a  solemn  vow  to  Heaven,  that  he 
would  never  accede  to  the  concession. 

At  the  general  election  of  1826,  when  Lord  George  Beres 
ford's  almost  hereditary  claims  to  represent  Waterford  county 
in  Parliament,  were  unexpectedly  contested  by  Mr.  Villiers 
Stuart,  a  retainer  to  act  as  counsel  for  Lord  George,  was  ac- 
cepted by  Mr.  Sheil.  There  was  some  dissatisfaction,  at  the 
time,  among  the  Catholics,  at  one  of  their  ablest  and  most 
trusted  leaders  acting  for  a  candidate  of  opposite  politics;  but 
O'Connell  frankly  and  publicly  did  him  the  justice  of  saying, 
that,  as  a  lawyer,  Mr.  Sheil  was,  in  a  manner,  bound  to  act  for 
whoever  employed  him.  As  there  never  was  a  question  of  the 
ability  with  which  he  performed  his  duty  on  that  occasion,  so 
was  there  never  a  belief  that,  in  such  performance,  Mr.  Sheil 
compromised  his  own  principles,  or  those  of  his  party.  The 
election  —  thanks  to  the  very  forty-shilling  freeholders,  to 
whose  disfranchisement  (as  part  of  the  price  of  Emancipation), 
O'Connell  would  have  consented,  in  1825  —  ended  in  the 
defeat  of  Mr.  Shell's  noble  and  anti-Catholic  client. 

The  death  of  the  Duke  of  York,  the  sworn  opponent  of  the 
Catholics,  took  place  in  1827,  and  Mr.  Sheil  took  occasion, 
during  and  after  his  illness,  to  make  some  speeches,  by  no 
means  in  good  taste,  upon  the  Royal  sufferer.  About  that 
time,  too,  he  Mas  prosecuted  for  too  much  freedom  of  speech 
on  Wolfe  Tone's  autobiography,  on  the  Catholic  Association 
(which  had  risen,  more  powerful  than  ever,  on  the  ruins  of 
that  which  was  suppressed  in  1825),  but  never  tried. 

In  the  following  year  (1828),  the  Catholic  Association,  in 
possession  of  ample  funds  from  "  the  Rent"  which  O'Connell 
had  established,  determined  to  resist  the  re-election  of  Mr. 
Vesey  Fitzgerald,  member  for  the  County  of  Clare,  because, 
though  he  had  always  voted  for  Emancipation,  he  had  taken 
office  in  the  Duke  of  Wellington's  Anti-Catholic  Government. 
O'Connell  was  the  opposing  candidate,  and,  after  a  fierce  and 
exciting  contest,  he  was  elected  by  an  overpowering  majority 


MEMOIR   Of   MR.   SHEIL.  9 

Mr.  Sheii  warmly  and  efficiently  assisted  in  this  contest  (of 
which  his  own  narrative  appears  in  the  second  volume)  ;  and 
his  speech  at  its  close,  eminently  practical  as  well  as  eloquent, 
is  entitled  to  rank  among  his  happiest  efforts. 

In  the  October  following,  being  in  London,  it  was  suggested 
that  Mr.  Sheil  should  speak  in  advocacy  of  the  Catholic  claims, 
at  a  great  Anti-Catholic  meeting  of  the  freeholders  of  Kent 
He  was  unable,  from  the  opposition  presented  to  himself  and 
other  liberals,  to  utter  more  than  a  single  sentence.  Having 
taken  the  precaution,  however,  to  give  a  copy  of  his  (intended) 
harangue  to  the  editor  of  "  the  Sun"  newspaper,  it  wTas  pub- 
lished, the  same  day,  as  part  of  the  proceedings,  and  made  a 
great  impression  on  the  public  mind.  Mr.  SheiPs  own  account 
of  the  Penenden  Heath  Meeting,  as  it  was  called  from  the 
locality  where  it  was  held,  appears  in  the  second  volume. 

The  Roman  Catholic  Relief  Bill,  passed  in  1829,  was  the 
natural  consequence  of  the  Clare  Election.  It  opened  a  new 
and  enlarged  sphere  of  action  to  Mr.  Sheil,  who  was  now  eli- 
gible to  sit  in  Parliament.  At  this  time  he  was  only  thirty- six 
years  old,  with  a  high  reputation,  great  powers,  and  immense 
popularity.  Through  the  influence  of  Lord  Anglesey,  he 
was  elected  for  the  borough  of  Milbourne  Port,  but  he  had 
previously  been  an  unsuccessful  candidate  for  the  County  of 
Louth  in  1830,  for  which  he  was  elected  in  1831.  He  was 
returned  for  the  County  of  Tipperary  in  1832  and  in  1835, 
without  a  contest,  and,  against  a  strong  opposition,  in  1S37. 
Accepting  office  in  1838,  he  was  again  unsuccessfully  opposed. 
From  1841  to  1850,  he  represented  the  small  Irish  borough  of 
Dungarvan. 

In  Parliament,  the  position  occupied  by  Mr.  Sheil  was  im- 
mediate, unquestioned,  and  exalted.  In  fact,  he  took  rank, 
at  once,  as  one  of  the  best  orators  in  the  House  of  Commons. 
He  was  far  from  being  a  ready  debater  —  though  some  of  his 
extempore  replies  were  quick,  reasoning,  and  acute — but  his 
prepared  speeches  enchained  attention,  and  won  the  applause 
even  of  his  antagonists.  He  had  the  disadvantage  of  a  small 
person,  negligent  attire,  shrill  voice,  and  vehement  gesticula- 
tion; but  these  were  all  forgotten  when  he  spoke,  and  his  sin- 

...     1* 


10  MEMOlii    OF    MR.    SftKTL. 

gularly  peculiar  manner  gave  the  appearance  of  impulse  even 
to  his  most  elaborated  compositions.  Words  can  not  briefly 
describe  the  character  of  Shell's  rhetoric  :  it  was  aptly  said,  in 
the  style  of  his  own  metaphors,  "he  thinks  lightning." 

Mr.  Sheil  was  personally  much  liked  by  all  parties  in  the 
Legislature.  In  1834,  when  he  was  charged  with  having 
secretly  and  treacherously  urged  the  Minister  to  carry  an 
Irish  Coercion  Bill,  which  the  liberal  members  were  publiclv 
opposing,  it  is  doubtful  whether  his  own  party,  or  his  oppo- 
nents, were  most  rejoiced  at  his  full  acquittal. 

After  his  entrance  into  parliamentary  life,  his  bar-practice 
in  Ireland  was  almost  wholly  neglected.  In  1844,  however, 
although  he  had  himself  avoided  participation  in  the  Repeal 
excitement,  he  reappeared  in  the  Four  Courts,  at  Dublin,  at  the 
State  Trials,  as  advocate  for  John  O'Connell,  and  delivered 
a  most  eloquent  speech  in  his  defence,  the  delivery  of  which 
occupied  six  hours.     This  closed  his  professional  career. 

From  his  entrance  into  Parliament,  he  rather  sided  with  the 
Whig  than  the  Irish  party.  In  time  he  had  his  reward  — 
having  been  successively  a  Commissioner  of  Greenwich  Hospi- 
tal, Vice-President  of  the  Board  of  Trade,  Judge-Advocate 
General,  and  Master  of  the  Mint,  besides  being  a  Queen's 
Counsel  and  Privy  Counsellor.  Of  late  3Tears,  his  voice  was 
seldom  heard  in  the  House.  He  seemed  to  think  that  his 
work  Avas  ended  with  Emancipation  and  the  abolition  of 
Tithes.  He  had  declined  into  a  mere  placeman  —  realizing 
Moore's  sarcasm  :  — 

"  As  bees  on  flowers  alighting,  cease  their  hum, 
So,  settling  upon  places,  Whigs  grow  dumb." 

Curiously  enough,  Mr.  Shell's  appointment  under  the  Whigs, 
in  1846,  to  the  office  of  Master  of  the  Mint,  broke  up  the  Irish 
party  which  O'Connell  long  had  led.  On  acceptance  of  office, 
it  was  requisite  that  he  should  go  back  to  his  constituents 
of  Dungarvan,  as  a  candidate  for  re  election.  A  strong  and 
rising  section  of  the  Repealers  urged  that,  as  in  1828  with 
Vesey  Fitzgerald,  Mr.  Sheil  should  be  opposed,  as  member  of 
a  Government  who  would  not  grant  "justice  to  Ireland,"  save 
on  the    stiongest   pressure   from  without.      O'Connell   would 


Memoir  of  mr.  siiEiL.  11 

nut  consent  thus  to  oppose  Slieil,  having  better  hopes  of  the 
Whigs  than  his  more  youthful  and  eager  associates.  O'Con- 
nell  allowed  Sheil  to  be  re-elected,  without  opposition,  on  the 
ground  of  his  own  reluctance  to  embarrass  the  Government. 
Certain  resolutions,  .affirming  this  temporizing  policy,  were 
proposed  by  John  O'Connell,  and  carried  by  a  large  majority 
in  the  Repeal  Association.  But  the  minority  —  more  power- 
ful in  virtues,  boldness,  and  talent,  than  in  numbers  —  seceded 
from  the  Association,  and  formed  what  was  called  the  "Young 
Ireland"  party,  resolved  to  achieve  the  independence  of  their 
country,  even  if  it  were  to  be  battled  for  with  arms  as  well 
as  words.  Most  distinguished  in  this  party  were  O'Brien, 
Mitchel,  Meagher,  and  Martin,  who  soon  after  founded  "  The 
Irish  Confederation,"  one  principle  of  which  was  opposition 
to  office  seeking  on  the  part  of  persons  professing  nationality. 
Soon  after,  O'Connell  died.  The  Revolutions  of  1848  came 
next,  and  that  which  Avas  attempted  in  Ireland,  with  an  unsur- 
passed purity  and  intensity  of  purpose,  failed  like  all  the  rest. 

In  November,  1850,  when  Lord  John  Russell  was  attacking 
the  Catholic  religion,  as  consisting  of  "  the  mummeries  of 
superstition,"  and  was  preparing  to  bring  in  his  Ecclesiastical 
Titles  Bill,  the  Embassy  to  Florence  was  offered  to,  and  ac- 
cepted by,  Mr.  Sheil,  whose  health  was  declining,  and  whose 
religious  feelings  must  have  been  opposed,  had  he  remained  in 
England,  to  Lord  John  Russell's  anti-Catholic  measures. 

To  Florence,  therefore,  he  proceeded,  full  of  hope  that  the 
fine  climate  would  renew  his  failing  health,  and  looking  on  li is 
appointment  as  a  dignified  close  to  his  public  career.  The 
suicide  of  Mr.  Power,  son  of  Mr.  Shell's  second  wife  (his  first 
had  been  Miss  O'Hallaran,  niece  of  Sir  William  M'Mahon, 
Master  of  the  Rolls  in  Ireland),  gave  him  such  a  shock  as  to 
induce  an  attack  of  gout  in  the  stomach,  of  which  he  died. 
His  remains  were  conveyed  to  Ireland  in  a  British  ship-of- 
war,  and  were  interred  at  Long  Orchard,  four  miles  from 
Templemore,  in  the  County  of  Tipperary. 

Fain  would  I  here  have  done  more  than  thus  briefly  and  rap- 
idly record  the  leading  events  in  Mr.  Sheil's  public  life,  but  my 
space  is  necessarily  limited.     Perhaps  I  may  have  the  oppor- 


12  MEMOIR   OF   MB.    StlffiL. 

tunity  of  doing  liim  fuller  justice  in  a  future  volume,  in  which 
I  may  attempt  to  give  pen-portraits  of  politicians  and  authors, 
artists  and  polemics,  lawyers  and  orators,  whom  I  have  known 
in  Europe. 

The  publication  of  "  Sketches  of  the  Irish  Bar"  was  com- 
menced  in  1822,  in  The  New  Monthly  Magazine,  a  London 
periodical  then  conducted  •  by  Thomas  Campbell,  the  poet. 
The  idea  originated  with  William  Henry  Ourran,  son  and 
biographer  of  the  great  Irish  orator  and  patriot,  but  the 
execution  was  Shell's. 

The  first  sketch,  which  appeared  in  August,  1822  (and  per- 
haps one  of  the  ablest,  being  analytic  as  well  as  rhetorical), 
was  that  of  Plunket.  The  far-famed  paper  on  O'Connell, 
which  is  the  best  known  of  the  series  (having  been  repeatedly 
reprinted  in  Europe  and  America,  and  translated  into  French, 
German,  Italian,  and  Spanish),  did  not  appear  until  July,  1823. 
It  immediately  attracted  attention  and  applause;  and,  from 
that  time,  the  "  Sketches  of  the  Irish  Bar"  were  eagerly 
looked  for  in  The  New  Monthly,  the  reputation  of  which  they 
mainly  contributed  to  sustain.  The  last  sketch  was  that  of 
Leslie  Foster,  published   in  February  and  March,  1829. 

A  schoolboy,  when  the  "  Sketches"  were  commenced,  (and, 
albeit  a  Protestant,  entertaining  a  strong  general  impression 
that  my  countrymen,  the  Irish  Catholics,  were  very  harshly 
treated,)  I  eagerly  perused  such  of  them  as  were  copied  into 
an  excellent  journal,  now  no  more,  called  The  Cork  Mercantile 
Chronicle.  As  I  grew  older,  I  could  better  appreciate  their 
keen  satire,  their  sharp  antithesis,  their  close  observation,  their 
personal  gossip,  their  liberal  spirit,  and  their  generous  senti- 
ment. At  last,  it  was  my  own  hap  to  become  a  member  of  the 
press,  at  an  age  when  (I  now  feel)  I  should  rather  have  been 
improving  my  own  mind,  than  presumptuously  attempting  to 
instruct  others. 

In  1826,  an  enterprising  bookseller  in  Cork  resolved  to 
make  the  experiment  of  trying  whether  Ireland,  which  eagerly 
received  her  literature  from  London  and  Edinburgh,  could 
support  a  periodical  of  her  own.     He  engaged  the  services  or 


MEMOIR    OF    MR.    SHEIL.  13 

some  distinguished  literati  in  the  South  of  Ireland,  and  had  no 
lack  of  younger  contributors  willing  to  write  for  "  the  honor 
and  glory"  of  being  in  print.  Among  these  were  several  who 
have  since  been  distinguished.  There  was  Callanan,  author 
of  the  exquisite  lyric  called  "  Gougane  Barra,"  whose  rhythm 
flows  along  like  the  melodious  rippling  of  a  gently-murmuring 
rivulet ;  there  was  O'Meagher,  author  of  a  poem  called  "  Zed- 
echias,"  and  now  the  efficient  and  able  Paris  correspondent  of 
the  London  Times;  there  was  O'Leary,  who  wrote  the  clianson 
a  boire  "  Whiskey,  drink  divine  !"  so  redolent  of  Innishowen  ; 
there  was  John  Windele,  now  a  zealous  and  rational  antiqua- 
rian ;  there  was  the  late  John  Augustus  Shea,  already  distin- 
guished among  his  fellows  for  poetic  genius,  flashing  wit, 
classic  eloquence,  and  social  companionship;  and,  lingering 
far  behind,  as  became  the  youngest  and  humblest,  the  writer 
of  this  notice  completed  the  array  of  volunteer  contributors. 

It  struck  all  of  us  that  the  periodical  would  at  once  achieve 
success,  if  Mr.  Sheil  could  be  induced  to  become  a  contributor. 
Mr.  Bolster,  the  publisher,  obtained  an  interview,  and  asked 
whether  Mr.  Sheil  could  write  for  him,  and  was  gratified  with 
an  affirmative  reply.  As  the  conversation  went  on,  Mr.  Sheil 
mentioned  several  subjects  on  which  he  was  willing  to  write. 
The  publisher  was  charmed  with  the  iuterest  wThich  the  future 
contributor  appeared  to  take  in  the  periodical.  At  last  came 
the  business  question  :  "  How  much  per  sheet  do  you  mean  to 
pay  ?"  The  somewhat  hesitating  reply  was,  that  no  payment 
was  contemplated  at  first,  but  that,  whenever  any  profits  ac- 
crued, he  might  depend  on  being  remunerated.  Mr.  Sheil 
shook  his  head  and  said,  "I  am  afraid  your  terms  will  not  suit 
me.  However,  as  you  have  done  me  the  compliment  of  wish- 
ing me  to  write  for  you,  I  must  give  you  something.  Instead 
of  calling  your  periodical  'Bolster's  Magazine  of  Ireland,' 
accept  a  more  appropriate  name  for  it,  from  me.  Considering 
the  place  whence  it  is  to  issue,  and  the  terms  which  you  offer, 
let  me  suggest  that  you  call  it  '  The  Cork-screw.'  '' 

My  own  personal  acquaintance  with  Mr.  Sheil  was  made  in 
October,  1828,  in  London,  on  the  evening  of  the  Penendeu 
Heath  Meeting.     His  conversation — full  of  wit  and  huraoi. 


14  MEMOIR   OF   ME.    SHEIL. 

with  graver  alternations  of  serious  talk — -was  the  charm  of 
that  gay  and  delightful  night. 

In  1844,  I  applied  to  Mr.  Sheil  for  permission  to  republish 
some  of  the  "  Sketches,"  and  his  prompt  reply  (of  which  a  fac 
simile  is  given  in  the  second  volume)  gave  the  promise  of  as- 
sisting me  in  making  the  selection.  I  was  then  at  Oxford,  and 
was  unable  to  call  upon  him  in  London  until  the  next  year.  He 
had  forgotten  my  name,  in  the  lapse  between  1828  and  1845. 
but  instantly  recollected  my  person  and  my  voice.  Entering 
heartily  into  my  views,  he  gave  me  whatever  permission  was 
in  his  poAver,  as  writer,  to  republish  the  "  Sketches,"  wholty  or 
in  part,  but  doubted  whether  the  copyright  did  not  belong  to 
Mr.  Col  burn,  the  proprietor  of  The  New  Monthly  Magazine, 
for  which  he  had  written  them.  He  gave  me  a  list  of  the 
whole  series,  and  further  drew  my  attention  to  two  other 
"  Sketches,"  which  had  appeared  in  the  first  volume  of  Camp- 
bell's Metrojwlitan  Magazine  in  1831.  These  (on  Lord-Chan- 
cellor Brougham  and  the  State  of  Parties  in  Dublin),  conclude 
the  second  volume,  and,  in  their  personal  details,  are  not  in- 
ferior in  interest  to  any  which  precede  them. 

Encouraged  by  the  frank  kindness  with  which  I  was  met,  I 
suggested  the  republication  of  all  the  "  Sketches,"  and  stated 
my  idea  of  the  manner  in  which  they  should  be  edited.  Mr. 
Sheil  stated  his  inability  —  from  pressure  of  other  occupations, 
and  a  distaste  of  the  literary  labor  it  would  impose  —  to  anno- 
tate, or  even  to  revise  the  articles ;  but  strongly  urged  me  to 
act  as  Editor — a  duty  for  which,  he  was  pleased  to  say,  I 
was  qualified  by  my  knowledge  of  politics  and  parties  in  Ire- 
land, and  my  acquaintance  with  most  of  the  persons  of  whom 
he  had  made  mention.  Thus  encouraged,  I  accepted  the 
charge,  and  had  repeated  conferences  on  the  subject,  during  the 
following  twelve  months  ;  but,  in  the  summer  of  1846,  Mr.  Sheil 
resumed  office  as  Master  of  the  Mint,  which  greatly  engrossed 
his  time,  and  my  own  was  so  much  occupied,  to  the  exclusion 
of  literary  labor,  that  I  was  unable  then  to  proceed  with  my 
task,  which  I  did  not  resume  until  recently. 

A  generation  has  passed  away  since  the  first  of  these 
"  Sketches"  appeared,  and,  had  I  edited  this  work  in  Englan<J 


MEMOIR   OF   MR.    SHEIL.  15 

I  must  have  freely  annotated  it,  to  make  its  allusions  to  per- 
sons and  things  perfectly  intelligible  to  the  present  race  of 
readers.  Doing  it  in  America,  I  felt  that  this  principle  must 
be  carried  out  yet  more  fully.  Therefore,  in  the  copious  notes 
and  illustrations  which  I  have  written  (so  copious,  indeed,  that 
my  own  portion  in  these  volumes  is  more  than  two  fifths  of  the 
whole),*  I  have  endeavored  to  make  the  reader  as  well  ac- 
quainted with  every  part  of  the  subject,  as  I  am  myself.  That 
I  have  been  laborious  I  know,  that  I  am  accurate  in  state- 
ments and  dates  I  believe.  My  own  political  opinions  being 
liberal,  their  tone  has  breathed  itself,  no  doubt,  into  what  I 
have  written,  but  I  trust  that  its  general  impartiality  will  be 
acknowledged.  Wherever  my  own  personal  knowledge  could 
avail,  I  have  freely  used  it.  All  of  the  subjects  of  the 
"Sketches"  I  have  seen  and  heard  in  public;  with  many  of 
them  I  was  more  or  less  acquainted. 

The  "  Sketches"  are  of  a  three-fold  character.  Some  are 
individual,  as  relating  to  public  men.  Some  show  the  practice 
of  the  Irish  Bar,  as  exhibited  in  reports  of  interesting  criminal 
cases.  The  third  class  consists  of  narratives  of  public  events 
connected  with  the  cause  of  civil  and  religious  liberty  in 
Ireland.  Thus,  there  are  graphic  descriptions  of  O'Oonnell, 
Plunket,  and  their  contemporaries.  There  are  the  thrilling 
narratives  of  Scanlan's  trial  at  Limerick  (on  which  Gerald 
Griffin  founded  his  tragic  story  of  "  The  Collegians")  and  the 
trials  of  Father  Carrol,  at  Wexford  ;  of  the  murderers  of  Dan- 
iel Mara,  at  Clonmel;  and  of  Gorman,  for  "  the  burning  of  the 
Sheas."  There  are  also  Mr.  Shell's  own  recollections  of  the 
formation  of  the  Catholic  Association  in  1823  ;  of  the  visit  of 
the  Catholic  Deputation  to  London  in  1825  ;  of  the  great  Clare 
Election,  and  the  Penenden  Heath  Meeting  in  1828;  and  of 
Lord  Brougham's  reception,  as  Chancellor,  in  1831.  Nor, 
amid  much  that  is  historical,  grave,  and  sometimes,  even  tragic, 
are  lighter  scenes  deficient,  such  as  the  account  of  the  Tabinet 
Ball,  the  Confessions  of  a  Junior  Barrister,  the  description  of 

*  Mr.  Sheil's  own  notes  to  these  "  Sketches"  are  few  —  aboi.t  six  or  eight  in 
the  two  volumes.  All  the  rest  of  the  annotations  are  my  own  and  initialed 
thus: — M. 


16  MEMOIR    OF    MB.    SHEIL. 

an  imaginary  Testimonial  to  Lord  Manners,  and  the  Sketch 
of  the  judicial  mime,  Lord  Norbury.  In  reality,  this  work, 
with  its  strong  contrasts  of  light  and  shade,  is  a  sort  of  peisonal 
history  of  Irish  politics  and  politicians  (for  the  Bar  did  not 
affect  neutrality),  during  the  half  centr  ry  following  the  parch- 
ment Union  between  Ireland  and  Great  Britain. 

The  portrait  of  Mr.  Sheil  in  this  volume,  is  a  fac-simile 
of  an  original  sketch  in  my  possession,  made  in  London,  in 
1825,  by  Mr.  S.  Catterson  Smith,  then  a  young  Irish  artist  of 
considerable  promise,  and  now  of  such  leading  eminence  that 
he  was  selected  to  paint  the  portrait  of  Lord  Clarendon,  late 
Viceroy  of  Irelpud,  to  be  placed  in  Dublin  Castle.  The  like- 
ness of  Mr.  Shell,  it  must  be  noted,  represents  him  as  he  was 
at  the  age  of  thirty-two. 

Here,  dismissing  these  volumes  from  my  hand*  I  conclude 
my  labors.  Here  are  rescued  from  the  perishable  periodicals  in 
which  they  mouldered,  the  admirable  productions  of  a  man, 
who,  while  our  language  lasts,  will  be  spoken  of  as  one  of  the 
most  brilliant  orators  that  Ireland,  affluent  in  eloquence,  ever 
had  cause  to  be  proud  of — productions  eman°ting  from  the 
freshness  of  his  purpurea  juventus,  before  his  patriotism  had 
been  rendered  cold  or  doubtful,  by  his  acceptance  of  place. 
They  stand  — 

"A  deathless  part  of  him  who  died  too  soon." 

My  own  part,  humble  as  it  is,  claims  to  be  honest  in  pur- 
pose, and  laboriously  faithful  in  execution.  I  believe  that  the 
"  Sketches  of  the  Irish  Bar,"  now  first  collected,  will  be  found 
•to  possess  abiding  interest,  because  they  emanate  from  a  mas- 
ter-mind, and  are  written  with  fidelity  and  spirit.  I  have 
arranged  them  in  an  order  different  from  that  in  which  they 
originally  appeared  (on  Mr.  Sheil's  own  suggestion,  that  there 
should  be  contrast  in  the  grouping),  but  I  present  them,  with- 
out mutilation  or  change,  as  they  were  first  given  to  the  public 

R.  Shelton  Mackenzie. 


AUTHOR'S    INTRODUCTION. 


When  I  first  visited  Dublin  (it  was  about  three  years  ago), 
I  was  a  frequent  attendant  at  the  Courts  of  Justice,  or,  as  they 
are  more  familiarly  styled,  the  "  Four  Courts."  The  printed 
speeches  of  Curran  had  just  fallen  into  my  hands;  and,  not- 
withstanding their  numerous  and  manifest  defects,  whether  of 
the  reporter  or  the  speaker,  the  general  effect  of  the  perusal 
was  to  impress  me  with  a  very  favorable  opinion  of  Irish  foren- 
sic eloquence.  Although,  as  an  Englishman,*  I  might  not 
participate  in  the  political  fervor  which  forms  one  of  their  chief 
recommendations  to  his  admirers  in  Ireland,  or,  in  my  severer 
judgment,  approve  of  a  general  style  that  differed  so  essen- 
tially from  the  models  of  British  taste,  still  there  was  a  fresh- 
ness and  vitality  pervading  the  whole  —  glowing  imagery  — 
abounding  phraseology  —  trains  of  argument  and  illustration 
at  once  vigorous  and  original  —  and  incessant  home  pushes  at 
the  human  heart,  of  which  the  attractions  were  entirely  inde- 
pendent of  local  or  party  associations. 

Under  these  impressions,  and  the  opportunity  being  now 
afforded  me,  I  made  it  a  kind  of  literary  object  to  ascertain 
how  far  the  peculiarities  that  struck  me  belonged  to  the  man 

*  Mr.  Sheil  commenced  these  Sketches  in  1822,  with  the  idea  of  their  being 
taken  as  the  production  of  an  impartial  Englishman,  and  he  continued  to  wea- 
thc  mask  long  after  common  report  had  assigned  his  writings  to  their  true  pa- 
ternity. In  his  account  of  the  Clare  Election,  which  took  place  in  1828,  and 
rendered  Catholic  Emancipation  inevitable,  Mr.  Sheil  frankly  admitted  the  au« 
Worship.  —  M. 


18  author's  introduction. 

or  the  country.  With  tins  view,  I  resorted  almost  daily  for 
the  space  of  two  terms  to  the  Four  Courts,  where  I  studied 
with  some  industry  the  manner  and  intellectual  character  of 
some  of  the  most  eminent  pleaders.  The  result  was,  a  little 
collection  of  forensic  sketches,  accurate  enough,  it  struck  me, 
as  far  as  they  went ;  but  on  the  whole  so  incomplete,  that  I 
had  no  design  of  offering  them  to  the  public:  they  remained 
almost  forgotten  in  my  commonplace-book,  until  his  Majesty's 
late  visit  to  Ireland,*  when  I  was  persuaded  by  a  friend  to 
follow  in  the  royal  train.  All  that  I  saw  and  thought  upon 
that  occasion  is  beside  my  present  purpose. 

I  return  to  my  sketches :  My  friend  and  I  remained  in  Ire- 
land till  the  month  of  December.  We  made  an  excursion  to 
the  lakes  of  Killarney  and  to  the  Giants'  Causeway ;  and, 
during  our  tour,  the  Circuits  being  fortunately  out,  I  was  thus 
furnished  with  the  means  of  correcting  or  confirming  many  ob- 
servations upon  some  of  the  most  prominent  subjects  of  my 
sketches.  The  same  opportunity  was  afforded  me  on  my  re- 
turn to  Dublin,  where  the  Courts  were  sitting  during  the  last 
month  of  our  stay.  I  now,  for  the  first  time,  and  principally 
from  deference  to  my  companion's  opinion  that  the  subject 
would  be  interesting,  resolved  at  a  leisure  hour  to  arrange  my 
scattered  memoranda  into  a  form  that  might  meet  the  public 
eye.  I  may  not  be  enabled  to  execute  my  plan  to  its  entire 
extent.  In  the  event  of  my  fulfilling  my  purpose,  I  must 
premise,  that  I  do  not  profess  to  include  every  member  of  the 
Irish  bar  who  has  risen  to  eminence  in  his  profession:  I  pro- 
pose to  speak  only  of  those  whom  I  heard  sufficiently  often  to 
catch  the  peculiarities  of  their  mind  and  manner;  and,  with 
regard  to  these,  I  beg  to  disclaim  all  pretensions  to  adjust  their 
comparative  merits  and  professional  importance.  Were  it  pos- 
sible, I  should  introduce  their  names  in  the  form  of  a  Round 
Robin,  where  none  could  be  said  to  enjoy  precedence. 

*  George  IV.  visited  Ireland  in  August,  1821,  and  had  no  cause  to  complain 
of  his  reception.  The  Irish  appeared  drunk  with  joy,  and  rattled  their  chain! 
aa  if  they  were  proud  of  them.  —  M. 


SKETCHES  OF  THE  IRISH  BAR, 


AN   IRISH    CIRCUIT. 

If  any  one,  tired  with  the  monotonous  regularity  of  a  more 
civilized  existence,  should  desire  to  plunge  at  once  into  another 
scene,  and  take  refuge  from  ennui  in  that  stirring  complexity 
of  feeling  produced  by  a  series  of  images,  solemn,  pathetic,  lu- 
dicrous, and  loathsome,  each  crossing  each  in  rapid  and  endless 
succession,  I  would  recommend  to  him  to  attend  one  of  the 
periodical  progresses  of  Irish  law  through  the  interior  of  that 
anomalous  country  ;  and  more  particularly  through  one  of  the 
southern  districts,  which,  out  of  deference  to  Captain  Rock,  I 
have  selected  as  the  scene  of  the  present  sketch. 

Going  circuit  in  Ireland,  though  of  great  importance  to  the 
health  of  the  bar  —  they  would  die  of  stagnation  else  —  is  at 
the  outset  but  a  dreary  piece  of  business*     When  the  time  ap- 

*  In  Great  Britain  and  Ireland,  the  Judges  go  "  on  circuit"  twice  a  year,  foi 
the  trial  of  criminal  cases  and  of  civil  or  Nisi  Prius  suits.  Each  circuit  con- 
sists of  a  certain  number  of  counties,  and  most  of  the  barristers  derive  a  consid- 
erable portion  of  their  incomes  from  their  labors,  as  advocates,  on  the  circuit 
A  barrister  may  change  his  circuit  once —  but  even  this  is  rare  —  and  the  ordi 
nary  practice  is,  having  once  commenced  in  one  district  (usually  including  the 
locality  of  his  own  relatives  and  friends),  always  to  continue  in  it.  When  a 
lawyer  is  called  out  of  his  own  to  plead  for  plaintiff  or  defendant  in  another 
circuit,  it  is  said  that  he  is  "  engaged  specially,"  and  receives  a  large  fee  or 
honorarium  accordingly.  The  largest  "  special"  fee  ever  received  in  Englan^ 
was  by  one  of  the  present  ex-Chancellors,  Lord  Truro  (then  Sir  Thomas  Wilde^ 


20  AN    IRISH   CIRCUIT. 

proaclies,'  one  can  generally  perceive,  by  the  faces  in  the  Hall,* 
that  it  is  felt  as  such.  There  are,  of  course,  exceptions.  A 
prosperous  man,  certain  of  a  rich  harvest  of  record-briefs,  a 
crown  prosecutor  with  the  prospect  of  a  "  bumper"  in  every 
jail,  a  sanguine  junior  confiding  in  the  promise  of  the  defence 
in  a  heavy  murder  case  or  two  to  bring  him  forward  —  the 
spirits  of  these  may  be  as  brisk,  and  their  eyes  shine  as  bright 
as  ever ;  but,  for  the  most  part,  the  presentiment  of  useless  ex- 
pense, and  discomfort  in  a  thousand  forms,  predominates.  The 
travelling  arrangements  are  made  with  a  heavy  heart;  the 
accustomed  number  of  law-books,  each  carefully  lapped  up  in 
its  circuit-binding,  and  never  perhaps  to  be  opened  till  its  re- 
turn, are  transferred  with  a  sigh  from  the  shelf  to  the  portman- 
teau ;  and  the  morning  of  departure  from  the  metropolis,  no 
matter  how  gay  the  sunshine  or  refreshing  the  breeze,  is  to 
many — to  more  than  will  dare  confess  it — the  most  melancholy 
of  the  year. 

It  certainly  requires  some  stoutness  of  sensibility  to  face  the 
south  of  Ireland.  I  have  often  heard  the  metropolis  described 
as  an  effort  of  Irish  ostentation.  The  truth  of  this  bursts  upon 
you  at  every  step  as  you  advance  into  the  interior.  With  the 
exception  of  the  roads,  the  best  perhaps  in  Europe,  the  gen- 
eral aspect  of  the  country  proclaims  that  civilization  and  hap- 
piness are  sadly  in  arrear.  Here  and  there  the  eye  may  find 
a  momentary  relief  in  the  commodious  mansion  and  tasteful 
demesne  of  some  opulent  proprietor;  but  the  rest  of  the  scene 
is  dismal  and  dispiriting.  To  those  accustomed  to  English 
objects,  the  most  fertile  tracts  look  bare  and  barren.  It  is  the 
country,  but  it  has  nothing  rural  about  it :  no  luxuriant  hedge- 
rows, no  shaded    pathways,  no   cottages  announcing  by  the 

who  had  nine  thousand  guineas,  or  $46,800,  for  going'  out  of  his  circuit  to 
plead  in  some  great  property  cause.  His  brief  (so  called,  like  hints  a  non  tu- 
cendo,  because  of  the  prolixity  of  such  documents)  extended  to  over  two  thou- 
sand pages.  From  one  to  five  hundred  pounds  stei'ling  is  the  usual  amount  of 
a  "  special"  fee.  —  A  record-brief  means  a  brief  in  a  civil  suit,  and  takes  its 
name  from  the  action  being  entered  or  placed  on  record  in  the  minutes  of  the 
Court,  before  it  can  be  tried.  —  M. 

*  Of  "  the  Four  Courts,"  the  Westminster  ball  of  Dublin,  and  the  subject  of 
a  subsequent  sketch. — M 


TRAVELLING    AS    IT    WAS.  21 

neatness  without,  that  cleanliness  and  comfort  are  to  be  found 
within  ;  but  one  midiversified  continuity  of  cheerless  stone- 
fences  and  roadside  hovels,  with  their  typhus-beds  piled  up  in 
front,  and  volumes  of  murky  smoke  forth  issuing  from  the  inte- 
rior, where  men  and  women,  pigs*  and  children,  are  enjoying 
the  blessings  of  our  glorious  constitution. 

I  travelled  in  a  public  conveyance.  We  were  four  inside  — 
myself,  a  barrister,  an  attorney ,t  and  a  middle-aged,  low-spir- 
ited Connaught  gentleman,  whom  at  first,  from  his  despondency, 
I  took  to  be  a  recent  insolvent,  but  he  turned  out  to  be  only 
the  defendant  in  an  impending  ejectment-case,  which  had  al- 
ready been  three  times  decided  in  his  favor.  The  roof  of  the 
coach  was  covered  (besides  other  luggage)  with  attorneys' 
clerks,  policemen,  witnesses,  reporters,  &c,  &c,  all  more  or 
less  put  in  motion  by  the  periodical  transfer  of  litigation  from 
town  to  country.  Before  our  first  breakfast  was  concluded,  I 
had  known  the  names  and  destination  of  almost  all  of  them, 
and  from  themselves ;  for  it  is  a  trait  of  Irish  character  to  be 
on  singularly  confidential  terms  with  the  public.  This  is  some- 
times troublesome,  for  they  expect  a  return  in  kind;  but  it  is 
often  amusing,  and  anything  is  better  than  the  deadly  tacitur- 
nity of  an  English  traveller.     How  often  have  I  been  whisked 

*  An  Irish  peasant  being  asked  why  he  permitted  his  pig  to  take  up  its  quar- 
ters with  his  family,  made  an  answer  abounding  with  satirical  naivete,  "  Why 
not  ?     Doesn't  the  place  afford  every  convenience  that  a  pig  can  require  ?" 

t  In  England,  during  the  seventy  or  eighty  years  immediately  antecedent  to 
railwayism,  and  formerly  in  Ireland,  the  etiquette  of  the  bar  jirohibited  a  bar- 
rister from  sharing  a  post-chaise  with  an  attorney.  The  principle  involved  was 
that  he  who  had  briefs  to  receive  should  not  be  on  familiar  terms  with  him  who 
had  them  to  give  —  such  being  the  relative  positions  of  the  respective  "limbs 
of  the  law"  in  question.  When  a  barrister  was  intimate  with  an  attorney,  he 
became  liable  to  the  imputation  of  playing  at  hugger-mugger,  or  cherishing  him 
for  interested  purposes.  At  one  time  it  was  considered  scarcely  correct  for  a 
barrister  to  dine  with  an  attorney  —  altogether  a  practitioner  of  a  lower  but 
very  money-making  class.  All  this  has  passed  away.  As  for  travelling,  the 
rule  which  allowed  barrister  end  attorney  to  go  together  in  a  mail  or  stage 
coach,  because  that  was  not  necessarily  tete-a-tete,  as  necessarily  would  be  in  a 
post-chaise  which  carried  only  two  persons,  extends  to  railway-carriages,  in 
which  all  members  of  the  profession,  including  the  Judges  themselves,  are  in* 
avoidably  mingled.  —  M. 


22  AN   IRISH  cmctrif. 

along  for  miles  and  hundreds  of  miles  with  one  of  the  latter 
species,  without  a  single  interchange  of  thought  to  enliven  the 
way,  with  no  return  to  any  overture  of  sociality  but  defensive 
hems  and  predetermined  monosyllables  ! 

There  is  no  stout-gentleman-like  mystery  upon  the  Irish 
roads.  The  well-dressed  young  man,  for  example,  who  sits 
beside  you  at  the  public  breakfast-table,  after  troubling  you 
for  the  sugar-bowl,  and  observing  that  the  eggs  are  musty,  will 
proceed,  without  further  introduction,  to  -tell  you,  "how  his 
father,  a  magistrate  of  the  county,  lives  within  three  miles  and 
a  half  of  the  Cove  of  Cork,*  and  what  fine  shooting  there  is  upon 
his  father's  estate,  and  what  a  fine  double-barrelled  gun  he  (the 
son)  has,  and  how  he  has  been  up  to  Dublin  to  attend  his  col- 
lege examinations,  and  how  he  is  now  on  his  way  down  again 
to  be  ready  for  the  grouse"  —  to  the  dapper,  pimpled-faced 
personage  at  the  other  side  of  the  table,  who,  while  his  third 
cup  of  tea  is  pouring  out,  reveals  pro  bono  publico  that  he  fills 

a  confidential  office  in  the  bank  of  Messrs. and  Co.,  and 

that  his  establishment  has  no  less  than  five  prosecutions  for 

forgery  at  the assizes,  and  that  he  is  going  down  to  prove 

the  forgery  in  them  all,  et  sic  de  ceteris. 

Upon  the  present  occasion,  however,  there  was  one  excep- 
tion. Among  the  outside  passengers  there  were  two  that  sat 
and  breakfasted  apart  (though  there  was  no  want  of  space  at 
the  public  table)  in  a  recess,  or  rather  a  kind  of  inner  room. 
One  of  them,  a  robust,  decent-looking  man,  if  alone,  would 
have  excited  no  particular  observation ;  but  the  appearance 
and  deportment  of  his  companion,  and  a  strange  sort  of  impres- 
sion which  I  could  perceive  that  his  presence  occasioned,  ar- 
rested my  attention.  He  was  about  thirty  years  of  age  ;  had  a 
long,  sunken,  sallow  visage,  with  vulgar  features ;  coarse, 
bushy,  neglected  black  hair;  shaggy,  overhanging  brows;  and 
a  dark,  deep-seated,  sulky,  ferocious  eye.     But  though  his  as- 

*  The  Cove  of  Cork,  one  of  the  finest  harbors  in  the  British  dominions,  has 
ceased  to  be  called  by  that  name.  A  few  years  ago,  on  the  first  visit  of  Queen 
Victoria  to  the  south  of  Ireland,  the  authorities  of  Cork,  in  the  toadying-  and 
sycophantic  spirit  which  often  disgraces  municipalities  as  well  as  individuals, 
petitioned  the  Crown  that  Cove  si  ould  be  called  Queen's-Town.  To  thifr 
prayer  the  Queen  "was  graciously  p  eased  to  consent."  —  M. 


Aft  APPROVER.  23 

pect  was  vulgar,  liis  dress  was  not  so.  It  consisted  of  a  new 
blue  coat  and  trowsers,  a  showy  waistcoat,  Wellington  boots,* 
and  a  gaudy-colored  silk  neckclotli.t  Little  or  no  conversation 
passed  between  him  and  his  companion,  who  never  separated 
from  him,  and  seemed  assiduous  in  his  care  that  the  best  fare 
the  inn  afforded  should  be  placed  before  him.  He,  however, 
seemed  untouched  by  the  attentions  bestowed  upon  him,  either 
rejecting  them  gruffly,  or  accepting  them  with  a  hardened, 
thankless  air.  His  manner  was  altogether  so  extraordinary, 
and  the  contrast  between  his  haggard,  forbidding  countenance 
and  his  respectable  attire  so  striking,  that  my  curiosity  was 
not  a  little  raised,  more  especially  as  I  could  see  that  several 
of  the  company  eyed  him  with  suspicion  and  dislike,  while  the 
waiters  approached  him  with  signs  of  aversion  which  they  took 
no  trouble  to  conceal.  Their  meal  being  concluded,  his  com- 
panion, after  paying  the  bill  for  both,  motioned  to  him,  with  a 
certain  air  of  command,  to  rise  and  follow  him.  He  obeyed, 
and  retired  in  the  same  sullen,  apathetic  manner  that  had 
marked  the  rest  of  his  demeanor.  From  these  appearances, 
my  first  conjecture  was  that  this  must  be  some  unfortunate  per- 
son of  imperfect  understanding,  who  was  travelling  under  the 
care  of  a  keeper. 

Upon  resuming  my  place  in  the  coach,  I  inquired  who  he 
was  from  one  of  my  fellow-passengers  (the  barrister),  and  was 
undeceived.  He  was  an  informer,  or,  more  technically  speak- 
ing, an  approver,  one  of  a  party  who  a  year  before  had  perpe- 

*  Apropos  des  bottes  !     The  duke  of  Wellington,  during  his  earliest  popular- 
ity, was  made  sponsor  to  two  articles  of  wearing  apparel.     While  he  was  in 
the  Peninsula,  they  were  immortalized  in  the  shape  of  an  epitaph: — 
"  Here  lies  the  duke  of  Wellington, 
Once  famed  for  battles  others  won ; 
Who,  after  making,  spending  riches, 
Bequeathed  a  name  to  —  boots  and  breeches!" — M. 
t  The  reader  may  recollect  part  of  the  song-writer's  description  of  an  Irish- 
man "  all  in  his  glory"  at  Donnybrook  Fair,  with  — 

"  A  new  Barcelona  tied  round  his  nate  neck." 
Widi  many  other  things,  better  and  worse,  Donnybrook  Fair,  which  was  held 
close  to  Dublin,  has  passed  away.     It  has  been  "  put  down"  (like  Bartholomew 
Fair,  in  London)  by  the  sovereign  power  of  the  Lord-Mayor.  —  M. 


24  AN    IRISH    CIRCUIT. 

trated  tlie  murder  of  an  entire  family  in  the  south.  He  had 
lately  been  taken,  had  turned  king's  evidence,  made  confes- 
sions which  led  to  the  apprehension  of  his  accomplices,  and 
was  now  proceeding,  under  charge  of  a  policeman,  to  be  a  wit- 
ness for  the  crown  upon  their  trial.*  This  information  explained 
only  a  part  of  what  I  had  seen.  I  observed  that  I  still  could 
not  comprehend  why  such  a  miscreant  should  appear  in  so 
respectable  a  dress,  and  be  treated  in  other  respects  with  a 
degree  of  indulgence,  to  which  another  in  his  condition  of  life 
(for  he  was  of  the  lowest  class),  though  unstained  by  any 
crime,  could  have  no  pretension.  The  barrister  made  answer: 
"  This  is  often  indispensable  for  the  purposes  of  justice,  for  it 
is  difficult  to  imagine  how  unmanageable  these  ruffians  some- 
times are.  They  know  the  importance  of  the  testimony  they 
have  to  give,  and  which  they  alone  can  give,  and  in  conse- 
quence become  capricious  and  exacting  in  the  extreme.  Though 
in  the  hands  of  government,  and  with  the  evidence  of  their 
own  admissions  to  convict  them,  they  take  a  perverted  pleas- 
ure in  exercising  a  kind  of  petty  tyranny  over  the  civil  authori- 
ties. They  insist  on  having  clothes,  food,  lodging,  modes  of 
conveyance  according  to  their  particular  whims;  and,  if  their 
impertinent  demands  be  resisted,  threaten  to  withhold  their 
evidence  and  submit  to  be  hanged.  One  starts  at  the  singu- 
larity of  a  man's  saying,  'Let  me  have  a  smart  new  blue  coat, 
with  double-gilt  buttons,  or  a  halter  —  a  pair  of  Wellington 
boots,  or  the  hangman  !'  but  our  desperate  villains  do  these 
things,  and  the  person  in  question  I  can  perceive  is  one  of 
them/' 

The  subject  thus  started  led  to  a  conversation  upon  Irish 
courts  of  justice.  I  was  in  luck,  for  my  fellow-traveller  teemed 
with  anecdotes,  which  he  related  with  native  fluency  and 
point,  touching  judges,  juries,  counsel,  witnesses,  criminals, 
hangmen,  and   aught  else  that  appertained  to  Irish  law.     He 

*  Mr.  Cumin  said,  in  one  of  his  speeches,  "  Informers  are  worshipped  in 
the  temple  of  justice  even  as  the  devil  has  been  worshipped  by  pagans  and  sav- 
ages—  even  so,  in  this  wicked  country,  is  the  informer  an  object  of  judicial 
idolatry  —  even  so  is  he  soothed  by  the  music  of  human  groans  —  even  so  is  he 
placated  and  incensed  by  the  fumes  and  by  the  blood  of  human  sacrifices."' — M. 


A    KKKRY    CLTENf.  2o 

told  inter  alia  (would  that  I  had  noted  down  the  details!)  how 
Lord  Avonmore*  to  his  latest  hour,  would  put  no  trust  in  a 
Kerry-man,  the  reason  being  (as  with  indignant  gravity  he 
used  to  justify  his  antipathy)  that  the  only  time  he  attended 
the  Tralee  assizes,  he  was  employed  in  a  single  half-guinea 
case,  in  which  he  failed.  And  a  day  or  two  after,  as  he  was 
travelling  alone  on  the  road  to  Cork,  he  was  waylaid  by  his 
clients,  reproached  for  his  want  of  skill,  and  forcibly  compelled 

*  Barry  Yelverton,  the  dearest  friend  of  Curran  and  the  beloved  of  the  good 
and  great  in  Ireland,  was  alike  distinguished  as  a  lawyer,  orator,  and  states- 
man. In  1782,  he  became  Attorney-General  of  Ireland.  In  1784,  he  succeeded 
Hussey  Burgh,  as  Chief  Baron  of  the  Exchequer.  In  June,  1795,  he  was  made 
Lord  Yelverton,  Baron  Avonmore.  In  December,  1800,  he  was  created  Vis- 
count Avonmore,  gaining  this  step  in  the  peerage  by  voting  for  the  Union — a 
vote  which  he  regretted  only  once,  and  that  was  to  his  dying  day.  Witty  him- 
self, he  was  the  cause  of  wit  in  others.  He  was  sometimes  very  absent  in 
mind.  On  one  of  these  occasions,  at  dinner,  when  the  common  toast  of  Our 
absent  friends  was  given,  while  Avonmore  was  in  a  reverie,  Curran  informed 
him  that  his  health  had  just  been  drank.  The  unsuspecting  judge  started  up, 
and,  after  a  very  eloquent  speech  in  acknowledgment,  learned  how  he  had  been 
hoaxed.  Of  all  his  forensic  speeches,  said  to  have  been  very  good,  only  a  brief 
fragment  exists  —  the  two  sentences  in  which  he  happily  described  what  Black- 
stone  had  done  for  the  laws  of  England  by  his  Commentaries.  "  He  it  was," 
said  he,  "  who  first  gave  to  the  law  the  air  of  science.  He  found  it  a  skeleton, 
and  he  clothed  it  with  life,  color,  and  complexion ;  he  embraced  the  cold 
statue,  and  by  his  touch  it  grew  into  youth,  and  health,  and  beauty."  Almost 
as  brief  is  what  has  been  left  to  us  of  his  parliamentary  eloquence,  which  was 
great.  Fitzgibbon,  afterward  Lord  Clare,  had  attacked  the  illustrious  Grattan 
in  his  absence.  Barry  Yelverton  defended  his  friend,  and  concluded  by  saying, 
"  The  learned  gentleman  has  stated  what  Mr.  Grattan  is :  I  will  state  what 
he  is  not.  He  is  not  styed  in  his  prejudices  ;  he  does  not  trample  on  the  resus- 
citation of  his  country,  or  live,  like  a  caterpillar,  on  the  decline  of  her  prosper- 
ity ;  he  does  not  stickle  for  the  letter  of  the  Constitution  with  the  affectation  of  a 
prude,  and  abandon  its  principles  with  the  effrontery  of  a  prostitute.1"1  Sir 
Jonah  Barrington  has  given  the  best  sketch  of  Barry  Yelverton.  There  are 
many  stories  afloat  as  to  his  stiff  jring  great  poverty  in  his  early  manhood, 
and,  as  a  proof,  his  pathetically  saying  to  his  mother,  "  Oh,  I  wish  I 
had  eleven  shirts  more  !"  When  his  mother  inquired  why  he  desired  to  have 
that  particular  number,  he  is  reported  to  have  explained  by  saying,  "  Because 
every  gentleman  should  have  a  dozens  Against  this  may  be  placed  the  fact 
trat  his  father  was  a  man  of  landed  property  in  the  county  of  Cork,  on  the 
banks  of  the  Blackwater,  and  that  his  uncle,  Charles  O'Keefe,  held  the  lucrative 
appointment  of  registrar  of  the  Court  of  Chancery  in  L"eland.  Lord  Avonmore 
died  on  the  19th  of  August,  1805. —  M. 

Vol.  L— 2 


2$  An  trish  circuit. 

to  refund  the  fee.  And  how  a  Clare  jury  of  old,  in  a  case  of 
felonious  gallantry,  acquitted  the  prisoner  of  the  capital  charge, 
but  found  him  guilty  of  "a  great  undacency ."*  And  how 
Harry  Grady,t  in  a  desperate  case  at  Limerick,  hoisted  an 
inebriated  bystander  upon  the  table  to  prove  his  statement, 
and  every  question  being  answered  by  a  hiccup,  got  a  verdict 
by  persuading  the  jury  that  the  opposite  party  had  made  his 
only  witness  drunk.  And  how  a  dying  felon,  after  confessing 
all  the  enormities  of  his  career,  was  asked  by  the  priest  if  he 
could  not  recollect  one  single  good  action  of  his  life  to  be  put 
to  the  credit  of  his  soul,  to  which  the  answer  was — "No, 
father  —  God  forgive  me,  not  one  —  not  a  single  —  Oh!  yes,  I 
now  remember  —  I  once  shot  a  ganger." 

The  entrance  of  the  bar  into  an  Irish  assize  town,  though 
still  an  event,  has  nothing  of  the  scenic  effect  that  distin- 
guished it  in  former  days.  At  present,  from  the  facilities  of 
travelling,  each  separate  member  can  repair,  as  an  unconnected 
individual,  to  the  place  of  legal  rendezvous.  This  has  more 
convenience,  but  less  of  popular  eclat. \     Till  about  half  a  cen- 

*  This  is  nothing  to  the  verdict  of  a  Welsh  jury,  "  Not  Guilty — but  we  rec- 
ommend him  not  to  do  it  again."  It  is  related,  also,  that  an  English  jury,  not 
very  bright,  having  before  them  a  prisoner  charged  with  burglary,  and  being 
unwilling  to  convict  him  capitally,  as  no  personal  violence  accompanied  the 
robbery,  gave  the  safe  verdict  "  Guilty  of  getting  out  of  the  window."  But  the 
most  original  was  that  of  an  Irish  jury  before  whom  a  prisoner  pleaded  "  Guil- 
ty," throwing  himself  on  the  mercy  of  the  court.  The  verdict  was  "  Not 
Guilty."  The  judge  in  surprise  exclaimed,  "  Why,  he  has  confessed  his  crime !" 
The  foreman  responded,  "Ah,  my  lord,  you  do  not  know  that  fellow,  but  we  do. 
He  is  the  most  notorious  liar  in  the  whole  county,  and  no  twelve  men  who 
know  his  character  can  believe  a  word  that  he  says."  So  the  prisoner  escaped, 
as  the  jury  adhered  to  their  verdict. — M. 

t  Harry  Deane  Grady  was  for  many  years  first  counsel  to  the  commiss:  oners 
of  customs  and  excise  in  Ireland.  When  this  office  was  abolished  as  useless 
and  expensive  (each  of  the  two  counsel  netting  £3,730  on  an  appointment 
with  a  salary  of  £100  a  year)  Mr.  Grady  was  awarded  a  life  pension  of  £2,000 
per  annum,  as  compensation  ! — M. 

J  At  present,  on  the  North  Wales  circuit,  where  not  more  than  a  dozen  bar- 
risters attend,  thty  travel  from  '  ounty  to  county  in  an  omnibus  of  their  own, 
which  also  conveys  their  clerks,  trunks,  and  other  luggage.  It  is  a  convenient 
and  cheap  arrangement.  There  is  more  practical  fun  among  lawyers  "  on  cir« 
Cttit,"  than  at  any  other  time.         Except  when  actually  ;n  tbe  Courts,  formal* 


A  LEGAL  CAVALCADE.  2? 

fury  ago,  it  was  otherwise.  Then  the  major  part  of  the  bar 
of  each  circuit  travelled  on  horseback,  and  for  safety  and 
pleasure  kept  together  on  the  road.  The  holsters  in  front  of 
the  saddles  —  the  outside-coat  strapped  in  a  roll  behind  —  the 
dragoon-like  regularity  of  pace  at  which  they  advanced,  gave 
the  party  a  certain  militant  appearance.  An  equal  number  of 
servants  followed,  mounted  like  their  masters,  and  watchful 
of  the  saddle-bags,  containing  the  circuit  wardrobe,  and  circuit 
library  that  dangled  from  their  horses'  flanks.  A  posse  of 
pedestrian  suttlers  bearing  wine  and  groceries,  and  such  other 
luxuries  as  might  not  be  found  upon  the  road,  brought  up  the 
rear.  Thus  the  legal  caravan  pushed  along;  and  a  survivor 
of  that  period  assures  me  that  it  was  a  goodly  sight ;  and  great 
was  the  deference  and  admiration  with  which  they  were 
honored  at  every  stage  ;  and  when  they  approached  the  assize 
town,  the  gentlemen  of  the  grand-jury  were  wont  to  come  out 
in  a  body  to  bid  them  welcome.  And  when  they  met,  the 
greetings,  and  congratulations,  and  friendly  reciprocities,  were 
conducted  on  both  sides  in  a  tone  of  cordial  vociferation  that 
is  now  extinct. 

For  the  counsellor  of  that  day  was  no  formalist ;  neither  had 
too  much  learning  attenuated  his  frame,  or  prematurely  quench- 
ed his  animal  spirits ;  but  he  was  portly  and  vigorous,  and 
laughed  in  a  hearty  roar,  and  loved  to  feel  good  claret  dis- 
porting through  his  veins,  and  would  any  day  prefer  a  fox- 
chase  to  a  special  retainer;  and  all  this  in  no  way  detracted 
from  his  professional  repute,  seeing  that  all  his  competitors 
were  even  as  he  was,  and  that  juries  in  those  times  were  more 
gullible  than  now,  and  judges  less  learned  and  inflexible,  and 
technicalities  less  regarded  or  understood,  and  motions  in 
arrest  of  judgment  seldom  thought  of — the  conscience  of  our 

ity  is  sent  away,  on  leave  of  absence,  and  the  bar-mess  becomes  the  focus  of 
wit  and  merriment  —  particularly  when,  in  a  sort  of  mock-court,  they  proceed 
to  the  trial  of  pseudo-offenders.  Once,  at  Lancaster,  where  the  Northern  Cir- 
cuit mess  was  honored  with  the  company  of  Lord  Brougham,  long  one  of  their 
most  distinguished  members,  who  had  become  Lord  Chancellor  of  EngJand, 
they  arraigned  him — for  desertion1.  He  pleaded  his  own  cause,  with  such 
infinite  wit,  that  the  jury  brought  in  a  verdict  of  "  Guilty"  against  the  accusei 
as  well  as  the  accused,  fining  each  of  them  a  dozen  of  claret. — M. 


$S  AN    IRISH    CIRCUIT. 

counsellor  being  ever  at  ease  when  lie  felt  that  his  client  was 
going  to  be  hanged  upon  the  plain  and  obvious  principles  of 
common  sense  and  natural  justice,  so  that  circuit  and  circuit- 
business  was  a  recreation  to  him;  and  each  day  through  the 
assizes  he  was  feasted  and  honored  by  the  oldest  families  of 
the  county,  and  he  had  ever  the  place  of  dignity  beside  the 
host;  and  his  flashes  of  merriment  (for  the  best  things  said  in 
those  days  were  said  by  counsellors)  set  the  table  in  a  roar, 
and  he  could  sing,  and  would  sing  a  jovial  song  too  :  and  if 
asked,  he  would  discourse  gravely  and  pithily  of  public  affairs, 
being  deeply  versed  in  state-concerns,  and,  peradventure,  a 
member  of  the  Commons'  house  of  parliament;  and  when  he 
spoke,  he  spoke  boldly,  and  as  one  not  fearing  interruption  or 
dissent  —  and  what  he  said  was  received  and  treasured  up  hy 
his  admiring  audience,  as  oracular  revelations  of  the  fate  of 
kingdoms  till  the  next  assizes.* 

*  It  may  be  necessary  to  state  that,  "  across  the  water,"  the  barrister  or 
counsellor  is  of  a  rank  superior  to  the  attorney  (without  whom  he  could  not 
earn  a  shilling),  and  has  a  different  line  of  business.  To  become  a  barrister  it 
is  only  necessary  for  a  gentleman  to  enter  his  name  on  the  books  of  one  of  the 
Inns  of  Court ;  to  pay  entrance-money  and  fees,  amounting  to  about  one  hundred 
and  twenty  pounds  sterling ;  to  eat  twelve  law-dinners  in  the  year,  during  four 
years ;  to  appear  before  the  Benchers  (eminent  barristers  of  long  standing)  and 
read  a  few  lines  of  a  thesis  on  some  point  of  law,  which  document  can  be  pur- 
chased for  a  few  shillings ;  and,  having  passed  through  this  ordeal,  facetiously 
termed  "  an  examination,"  then  to  be  admitted  to  the  rank  of  an  utter  or  outer 
barrister  (because  none  but  Queen's  Counsel,  Sergeants-at-Law,  or  barristers 
with  patents  of  precedency,  can  sit  within  the  bar  in  the  Law  Courts),  and  be 
"  called  to  the  bar,"  by  having  his  name  shouted  out,  at  dinner,  calling  him 
from  the  students'  to  the  upper  or  barristers'  table.  It  will  be  seen,  from  this, 
that  as  the  barrister  receives  no  instruction  during  his  four  years  of  pupilage,  it 
entirely  rests  with  himself  whether  and  in  what  manner  he  shall  obtain  a  knowl- 
edge of  the  law.  This  is  to  be  done  by  study,  by  attendance  at  the  chambei'3 
of  some  eminent  pleader  (to  whom  he  usually  pays  one  hundred  pounds  sterling), 
and  by  noticing  the  practice  of  the  law  during  his  attendance  in  the  courts. 
On  the  other  hand,  you  must  be  regularly  apprenticed  to  an  attorney  for  five 
years,  and,  when  your  time  is  served,  pass  through  a  very  strict  examination 
in  law  and  its  practice  before  you  are  admitted  as  an  attorney.  In  no  case  can 
a  client  do  business,  directly,  with  the  hamster,  who  can  only  be  approached, 
professionally,  by  the  attorney.  It  is  precisely  as  if  a  man  being  ill,  the  physi- 
cian should  refuse  to  prescribe  for  him,  unless  his  symptoms  and  ailments  were 
detailed,  at  second-hand,  by  the   apothecary.     The  attorney  literally  acts  as 


THE   COUNSELLOR'S    SOCIAL   STATUS.  29 

Tims  far  my  informant — himself  a  remnant  of  this  by-gone 
race,  and  as  such  contrasting,  not  without  a  sigh,  the  modern 
degeneracy  of  slinking  into  a  circuit-town  in  a  corner  of  the 
Dublin  mail,  with  the  pomp  and  circumstance  that  marked  the 
coming  of  the  legal  tourist  in  the  olden  time.  Still  the  circuit- 
going  barrister  of  the  present  day,  though  no  longer  so  promi- 
nent an  object  of  popular  observance,  is  by  no  means  considered 
as  an  ordinary  person.  The  very  title  of  Counsellor  continues 
to  maintain  its  major  influence  over  the  imaginations  of  the 
populace.  When  he  comes  to  be  known  among  them,  land- 
lords, waiters,  guards,  and  coachmen,  bow  to  him  as  low,  and 
are  as  alert  in  service,  as  if  he  were  a  permanent  grand-jury- 
man, or  chief-magistrate  of  police.  At  an  assizes  ball  (if  he  be 
still  in  his  juniority)  the  country -belles  receive  him  with  their 
choicest  smirks,  Avhile  the  most  influential  country-gentlemen 
(excepting  those  who  have  received  a  college  education,  or  who 
have  been  to  Cheltenham)  are  cautious  and  complimentary  in 
their  converse  with  one  who  can  take  either  side  of  any  ques 
tion  extcmjiore,  divide  it,  by  merely  crossing  his  fingers,  into 
three  distinct  points  of  view,  and  bring  half  a  dozen  knock- 
down arguments  to  bear  upon  each. 

jackall  to  the  barrister;  but  an  attorney  in  good  practice,  who  has  many  law- 
suits to  carry  on,  has  it  in  his  power  to  help  a  clever. young  barrister,  by  em- 
ploying him  as  junior  counsel  in  such  suits  —  there  ordinarily  being  at  least  two 
barristers  on  each  side  in  every  civil  or  Nisi  Prius  trial.  The  attorney  "  gets 
up  the  case" — prepares  the  brief  or  statement  of  facts  and  evidence,  with  refer- 
ences to  points  of  law,  and  previous  decisions  of  the  Courts  also  —  fixes  the 
amount  of  fees  to  counsel,  and  pays  the  money  on  delivery  of  the  brief;  there 
being  the  anomaly  that,  while  the  barrister's  fee  is  not  recoverable  by  law,  the 
attorney's  bills  of  costs  are,  and  their  amount  is  fixed  by  rules  of  Court,  and 
taxed  by  proper  officers.  There  is  no  instance  on  record  of  a  barrister's  ever 
having  become  an  attorney.  Several  of  the  best  men  at  the  bar  (among  whom 
Lord  Truro  now  stands)  have  commenced  as  attorneys.  To  effect  this  change 
the  man  must  cease  to  be  an  attorney,  by  having  his  name  struck  off  the  Court- 
roll,  before  he  can  enter  as  a  student  at  one  of  the  Inns  of  Court,  where,  after 
four  years'  delay,  as  above  mentioned,  he  may  be  called  to  the  bar.  Should  it 
be  discovered  that  a  barrister  has  professionally  acted  without  being  "  in- 
structed" by  an  attorney,  or  that  he  has  an  understanding  to  the  effect  of  shar- 
ing profits  with  an  attorney,  he  would  be  disbarred  —  that  is,  ftirned  out  of  the 
profession.  —  M. 


30  AN   IRISH    CIRCUIT. 

The  most  striking  scenes  upon  an  Irish  circuit  are  to  be 
found  in  the  criminal  courts.  The  general  aspect  of  the  in- 
terior, and  the  forms  of  proceeding,  have  nothing  peculiar; 
but  scarcely  a  case  occurs  that  does  not  elicit  some  vivid 
exhibition  of  national  character,  or  afford  matter  of  serious 
reflection  upon  the  moral  and  political  condition  of  the  country. 
I  would  add,  that  the  very  absence  of  such  reflection  on  the 
part  of  the  spectators,  is  itself  an  observable  phenomenon  :  for 
instance,  the  first  morning  that  I  entered  the  Crown  Court  at 

,  I  perceived  the  witness-table  covered    by  a  group  of 

mountain-peasantry,  who  turned  out  to  be  three  generations 
of  one  family,  grandfather,  father,  and  three  or  four  athletic 
sons.  Their  appearance,  though  decent,  was  wild  and  pictur- 
esque. They  were  all  habited  in  a  complete  suite  of  coarse 
blue  frieze.  The  eldest  of  the  party  sustained  himself  upon  a 
long  oaken  staff,  which  gave  to  him  a  certain  pastoral  air, 
while  each  of  the  others,  down  to  the  youngest,  a  fine,  fierce, 
black-haired,  savage-eyed  lad  of  seventeen,  was  armed  with  a 
formidable  club  of  the  same  favorite  timber.  The  old  man 
resting  upon  his  staff,  and  addressing  the  interpreter,  was 
meekly  and  deliberately  explaining,  in  the  Irish  language,  for 
the  information  of  the  court,  the  object  of  his  application.  It 
needed  no  interpreter  to  tell  me  that  he  was  recounting  a  tale 
of  violence  and  wrong.  The  general  purport,  as  he  proceeded, 
was  intelligibly  translated  in  the  kindling  looks,  the  vehement 
gesticulation  —  and,  where  any  circumstance  was  omitted  or 
understated  —  the  impassioned  and  simultaneous  corrections 
of  the  group  behind  him.  Though  he  more  than  once  turned 
round  to  rebuke  their  impetuosity,  it  was  easy  to  perceive  that 
his  own  tranquillity  of  manner  was  the  result  of  effort ;  but  the 
others,  and  least  of  all  the  younger  portion  of  the  party,  could 
not  submit  to  restrain  their  emotions.  The  present  experi- 
ment of  appealing  to  the  laws  was  evidently  new  to  them,  and 
unpalatable.  As  they  cast  their  quick  suspicious  glances 
round  them,  and  angrily  gave  their  cudgels  a  spasmodic  clench, 
they  looked  less  like  suitors  in  a  court  of  justice,  than  as  an 
armed  deputation  from  a  barbarous  tribe,  reluctantly  appearing 
in  a  civilized  enemy's  camp  with  proposals  for  a  cessation  q£ 


OCCUPANTS    OF   TEE    DOCK.  31 

hostilities.  And  there  was  some  such  sacrifice  of  warlike  in 
stincts  in  the  present  instance.  The  party,  for  once  listening 
to  pacific  counsel,  had  come  clown  from  their  hills  to  seek  com- 
pensation from  the  county  for  the  loss  of  their  house  and  stock, 
which  had  been  maliciously  burned  down  —  they  suspected, 
but  had  no  proof — by  "  their  old  enemies  the  O'Sullivans." 
Yet  the  details  of  their  case,  embracing  midnight  conflagration, 
imminent  risk  of  life,  destruction  of  property,  produced,  so 
familiar  are  such  outrages,  not  the  slightest  sensation  in  a 
crowded  court.  Some  necessary  forms  being  gone  through, 
they  were  dismissed,  with  directions  to  appear  before  the  grand 
jury  ;  and  I  do  not  forget  that,  as  they  were  retiring,  the 
youngest  of  the  party  uttered  a  vehement  exclamation,  in  his 
native  tongue,  importing — "  That  if  the  grand-jury  refused 
them  justice,  every  farthing  of  their  loss  should  (come  of  it 
what  would)  be  punctually  paid  down  to  them  in  the  blood  of 
the  O'Sullivans." 

The  dock  of  an  Irish  county-court  is  quite  a  study.  From 
the  character  of  the  crimes  to  be  tried,  as  appearing  on  the 
calendar,  I  expected  to  find  there  a  collection  of  the  most 
villanous  faces  in  the  community  :  it  was  the  very  reverse. 
I  would  even  say  that,  as  a  general  rule,  the  weightier  the 
charge,  the  better  the  physiognomy,  and  more  prepossessing 
the  appearance  of  the  accused.  An  ignoble  misdemeanant,  or 
sneaking  petty-larcenist,  may  look  his  offence  pretty  accu- 
rately ;  but  let  the  charge  amount  to  a  good  transportable  or 
capital  felony,  and  ten  to  one  but  the  prisoner  will  exhibit  a 
set  of  features  from  which  a  committee  of  craniologists  would 
never  infer  a  propensity  to  crime.  In  fact,  an  Irish  dock, 
especially  after  a  brisk  insurrectionary  winter,  affords  some  of 
the  choicest  samples  of  the  peasantry  of  the  country  —  fine, 
hardy,  healthy,  muscular  looking  beings,  with  rather  a  dash  of 
riot  about  the  eye,  perhaps,  but  with  honest,  open,  manly  coun- 
tenances, and  sustaining  themselves  with  native  courage  amid 
the  dangers  that  beset  them;  and  many  of  them  are  in  fact 
either  as  guiltless  as  they  appear,  or  their  crimes  have  been 
committed  under  ciicumstances  of  excitation,  which,  in  their 
own  eyes  at  least,  excuse  the  enormity.     With  regard  to  tbp 


32  AN   IRISH   CIRCUIT. 

former,  there  are  one  or  two  national  peculiarities,  and  not  of 
a  very  creditable  kind,  which  account  for  their  numbers. 

The  lower  orders  of  the  Irish,  when  their  passions  are  once 
up  on  the  right  side,  are  proverbially  brave,  disinterested,  and 
faithful ;  but  reverse  the  object,  give  them  a  personal  enemy 
to  circumvent,  or  an  animosity  of  their  faction  to  gratify, 
and  all  the  romantic  generosity  of  their  character  vanishes 
As  partisans,  they  have  no  more  idea  of  "  fair  play,"  than 
a  belligerent  Indian  of  North  America.  In  the  prosecution 
of  their  interminable  feuds,  if  they  undertake  to  redress 
themselves,  armed  members  will  beset  a  single  defenceless 
foe,  and  crush  him  without  remorse ;  and  in  the  same  spirit 
of  reckless  vengeance,  when  they  appeal  to  the  law,  they  do 
not  hesitate  to  include  in  one  sweeping  accusation,  every  friend 
or  relative  of  the  alleged  offender,  whose  evidence  might  be 
of  any  avail  upon  his  defence ;  and  hence,  for  the  real  or 
imputed  crime  of  one,  whole  families,  men  and  women,  and 
sometimes  even  children,  are  committed  to  prison,  and  made 
to  pass  through  the  ordeal  of  a  public  trial.  Another  prolific 
source  of  these  wanton  committals  is  a  practice,  pretty  ancient 
in  its  origin,  but  latterly  very  much  on  the  increase,  of  at- 
tempting to  succeed  on  a  question  of  civil  right  by  the  aid  of  a 
criminal  prosecution.  Thus  the  legality  of  a  distress  for  rent 
will  come  on  to  be  tried  for  the  first  time  under  the  form  of  a 
charge  for  cow-stealing,  or  the  regularity  of  a  "  notice  to  quit," 
upon  an  indictment  for  a  forcible  and  felonious  dispossession* 

*  These  vindictive  or  wanton  prosecutions  are  becoming  so  frequent,  and 
the  immediate  and  consequential  evils  are  so  great — for  revenge  in  some  law- 
less form  or  other  is  sure  to  follow — that  the  government  of  the  country  ought 
to  interfere.  The  judges,  when  such  cases  come  before  them,  never  fail  to  ex- 
press their  indignation,  and  to  warn  the  magistracy  to  be  more  cautious  in 
granting  committals  without  thoroughly  sifting  the  truth  of  the  depositions  upon 
which  they  are  grounded  ;  but  the  guilty  party,  the  malicious  prosecutor,  es- 
capes inpunished.  His  crime  is  wilful  perjury — but  this  is  an  offence  against 
which,  by  a  kind  of  general  consent  in  Ireland,  the  laws  are  seldom  or  never 
put  in  force — and  hence  one  of  the  causes  of  its  frequency ;  but  if  prosecutors 
and  their  witnesses  were  made  practically  to  understand  that  the  law  would 
hold  them  responsible  for  the  truth  of  what  they  swear,  if  the  seve.al  crown 
solicitors  were  instructed  to  watch  the  trials  upon  their  respective  circuits,  and 
%q  make  every  flagrant  case  of  perjury  that  appeared  the  subject  of  prompt  and 


LARRY    CRONAN'S   TRIAL.  33 


But  even  omitting  these  exceptions,  I  should  say  from  my  own 
observations  that  an  Irish  jail  is,  for  the  most  part,  delivered* 
of  remarkably  fine  children,  particularly  "  the  boys,"  though 
from  the  numbers  at  a  single  birth,  it  would  be  too  much  to 
expect  that  they  all  should  be  found  "  doing  well."  In  many 
the  vital  question  is  quickly  decided,  while  in  others,  and  it  is 
for  these  that  one's  interest  is  most  raised,  the  chances  of  life 
and  death  appear  so  nicely  balanced,  that  the  most  experi- 
enced observer  can  only  watch  the  symptoms,  without  ventur- 
ing to  prognosticate  the  issue.  Such,  to  give  an  apposite  ex- 
ample, was  the  memorable  instance  of  Larry  Oronan. 

Larry  Oronan  was  a  stout,  hardy,  Irish  lad,  of  five-and- 
twenty.  Like  Saint  Patrick,  "  he  came  of  dacent  people."t 
He  was  a  five-pound  freeholder  —  paid  his  rent  punctually  — 
voted  for  his  landlord,  and  against  his  conscience — seldom 
missed  a  mass,  a  fair,  a  wake,  or  a  row — hated,  and  occasion- 
ally cudgelled  the  tithe-proctor  —  loved  his  neighbor — had  a 

vigorous  prosecution,  some  check  might  be  given  to  what  is  now  a  monstrous 
and  increasing  mischief.  The  experiment,  I  understand,  was  made  some  time 
ago  at  Cork,  and,  though  only  in  a  single  instance,  with  a  very  salutary  effect. 
On  the  first  day  of  the  assizes,  a  by-stander,  seeing  a  dock  friend  in  danger, 
jumped  upon  the  table  to  give  him  "  the  loan  of  an  oath."  His  testimony  turn- 
ing out  to  be  a  tissue  of  the  grossest  perjury,  the  judge  ordered  a  bill  of  indict- 
ment for  the  offence  to  be  forthwith  prepared  and  sent  up  to  the  grand  jury. 
The  bill  was  found,  and  in  the  course  of  the  same  day,  the  offender  was  tried, 
convicted,  sentenced  to  transportation,  put  on  board  a  convict-ship  then  ready 
to  sail,  and,  by  day-break  next  morning  found  himself  bearing  away  before  a 
steady  breeze  for  Botany  bay.  The  example  had  such  an  effect,  that  scarcely 
an  alibi-witness  was  to  be  had  for  love  or  money  during  the  remainder  of  the 
assizes. 

*  The  word  "  delivered,"  is  used  here  in  reference  to  the  fact  that,  in  Great 
Britain  and  Ireland,  the  judges  of  assize,  who  go  on  circuit,  from  county  to 
county,  arc  bound  to  make  "  a  general  jail  delivery,"  that  is,  to  try  every  prison- 
er, in  each  place,  unless  the  inquiry  before  the  grand  jury  should  ignore  the  bills 
of  indictment,  or,  "  a  true  bill"  being  found,  the  trial  is  deferred  from  some 
legal  cause.  Sometimes,  of  course,  when  the  crown  prosecutor  declines  trying 
the  accused,  the  "  nolle  prosequi"  opens  the  prison-door,  and  sometimes,  when 
the  offence  is  not  very  heavy  the  prisoner  is  liberated  pro  tern.,  on  giving  bail 
for  his  appearance,  to  be  tried  at  the  next  assizes. — M. 

t  "  Saint  Patrick  was  a  gentleman, 

And  came  of  dacent  people." — Irish  Song. 

2* 


34  AN    IRISH    CIRCUIT. 

wife  and  five  children,  and,  on  the  whole,  passed  for  one  of  the 
most  prosperous  and  well-conducted  boys  in  his  barony.  All 
this,  however,  did  not  prevent  his  being  "  given  to  understand 
by  the  Clerk  of  the  Crown,"  at  the  summer  assizes  for  his  native 
county,  that  he  stood  indicted  in  No.  15,  for  that  he,  on  a  cer- 
tain night,  and  at  a  certain  place,  feloniously  and  burglariously 
entered  a  certain  dwelling-house,  and  then  and  there  commit- 
ted the  usual  misdeeds  against  his  majesty's  peace  and  the 
statute  ;  and  in  No.  16,  that  be  stood  capitally  indicted  under 
the  Ellenborough  act;*  and  in  No.  18,  for  a  common  assault. 
I  was  present  at  his  trial,  and  still  retain  a  vivid  recollection 
of  the  fortitude  and  address  with  which  he  made  his  stand 
against  the  law  ;  and  yet  there  were  objects  around  him  quite 
sufficient  to  unnerve  the  boldest  heart  —  a  wife,  a  sister,  and 
an  aged  mother,  for  such  I  found  to  be  the  three  females  that 
clung  to  the  side  bars  of  the  dock,  and  awaited  in  silent 
agony  the  issue  of  his  fate.  But  the  prisoner,  unsoftened  and 
undismayed,  appeared  unconscious  of  their  presence.  Every 
faculty  of  his  soul  was  on  the  alert  to  prove  to  his  friends  and 
the  county  at  large,  that  he  was  not  a  man  to  be  hanged  with- 
out a  struggle.  He  had  used  the  precaution  to  come  down  to 
the  dock  that  morning  in  his  best  attire,  for  he  knew  that  with 
an  Irish  jury,  the  next  best  thing  to  a  general  good  character 
is  a  respectable  suit  of  clothes.  It  struck  me  that  his  new 
silk  neckkerchief,  so  bright  and  glossy,  almost  betokened 
innocence ;  for  who  would  have  gone  to  the  unnecessary  ex- 
pense, if  he  apprehended  that  its  place  was  so  soon  to  be  sup- 
plied by  the  rope?  His  countenance  bore  no  marks  of  his 
previous  imprisonment.  He  was  as  fresh  and  healthy,  and 
his  eye  as  bright,  as  if  he  had  all  the  time  been  out  on  bail. 

When  his  case  was  called  on,  instead  of  shrinking  under  the 
general  buzz  that  his  appearance  excited,  or  turning  pale  at 
the  plurality  of  crimes  of  which  he  was  arraigned,  he  man- 
fully looked  the  danger  in  the  face,  and  put  in  action  every 
resource  within  his  reach    to  avert  it.     Having  despatched  a 

*  A  law  passed  by  the  British  parliament,  it  the  instance  of  the  late  Lord 
Ellenborough,  chief-justice  of  England.  It  provided  punishment  for  such 
offences  againg^  the  person  as  "  cutting  and  maiming,  or  mayhem." — M. 


LARRY    CRONAN'S    TRIAL.  35 

messenger  to  bring  in  O'Oonnell  from  the  other  court,*  and 
beckoned  to  his  attorney  to  approach  the  dock-side,  and  keep 
within  whispering  distance  while  the  jury  were  swearing,  he 
"  looked  steadily  to  his  challengers,"  and  manifested  no  ordi- 
nary powers  of  physiognomy,  in  putting  by  every  juror  that 
had  anything  of  "  a  dead,  dull,  hang  look."  He  had  even  the 
sagacity,  though  against  the  opinion  of  the  attorney,  to  strike 
off  one  country-gentleman  from  his  own  barony,  a  friend  of  his 
in  other  respects,  but  who  owed  him  a  balance  of  three  pounds 
for  illicit  whiskey.  Two  or  three  sets  of  alibi  witnesses,  to 
watch  the  evidence  for  the  crown,  and  lay  the  venue  of  his 
absence  from  the  felony  according  to  circumstances,  were  in 
waiting,  and,  what  was  equally  material,  all  tolerably  sober. 
The  most  formidable  witness  for  the  prosecution  had  been 
that  morning  bought  off.  The  consideration  was,  a  first  cousin 
of  Larry's  in  marriage,  a  forty-shilling  freehold  upon  Larry's 
farm,  with  a  pig  and  a  plough  to  set  the  young  couple  going. 
Thus  prepared,  and  his  counsel  now  arrived,  and  the  bustle 
of  his  final  instructions  to  his  attorney  and  circumstandiug 
friends  being  over,  the  prisoner  calmly  committed  the  rest  to 
fortune;  resembling  in  this  particular  the  intrepid  mariner, 
who,  perceiving  a  storm  at  hand,  is  all  energy  and  alertness 
to  provide  against  its  fury,  until,  having  done  all  that  skill  and 
forethought  can  effect,  and  made  his  vessel  as  "  snug  and 
tight"  as  the  occasion  will  permit,  he  looks  tranquilly  on  as 
she  drifts  before  the  gale,  assured  that  her  final  safety  is  now 
in  other  hands  than  his. 

*  Mr.  O'Connell's  success  with  juries,  whether  in  criminal  or  nisi  prius  cases, 
was  very  great.  He  went  the  Minister  circuit  (which  included,  the  southern 
comities  of  Ireland — Clare,  Limerick,  Kerry,  Cork,  and  Watcrford),  and  almost 
invariably  held  a  brief  for  the  defence  in  all  criminal  prosecutions.  His  busi- 
ness on  circuit  was  so  great  that,  except  in  very  important  cases,  he  could  not 
read  the  prisoners'  briefs.  But  the  attorney  for  the  defence  used  to  condense 
the  leading  facts  and  set  them  down  on  a  single  sheet  of  foolscap,  and  O'Con- 
nell  usually  found  time  to  peruse  and  master  them,  during  the  speech  of  the 
crown  counsel  for  the  prosecution,  relying  on  his  own  skill  in  the  cross-exami- 
nation of  witnesses  and  his  power  with  the  jury.  Like  Belial,  he  "  could  make 
the  worse  appear  the  better  reason,"  as  many  an  acquitted  culprit  had  cause  Ua 
Know  and  be  grateful  for. — M. 


36  AN    IRISH    CIRCUIT. 

The  trial  went  on  after  the  usual  fashion  of  trials  of  the 
kind.  Abundance  of  hard  swearing  on  the  direct ;  retractions 
and  contradictions  on  the.  cross-examinations.  The  defence 
was  a  masterpiece.  Three  several  times  the  rope  seemed 
irrevocably  entwined  round  poor  Larry's  neck  —  as  many 
times  the  dexterity  of  his  counsel  untied  the  Gordian  knot. 
From  some  of  the  witnesses  he  extracted  that  they  were 
unworthy  of  all  credit,  being  notorious  knaves  or  process- 
servers.  Others  he  inveigled  into  a  metaphysical  puzzle 
touching  the  prisoner's  identity  ;  others  he  stunned  by  re- 
peated blows  with  the  butt-end  of  an  Irish  joke.  For  minutes 
together,  the  court,  and  jury,  and  galleries,  and  dock,  were  in 
a  roar.  However  the  law  or  the  facts  of  the  case  might  turn 
out,  it  was  clear  that  the  laugh,  at  least,  was  all  on  Larry's 
side.  In  this  perilous  conjuncture,  amid  all  the  rapid  alter- 
nations of  his  case  —  now  the  prospect  of  a  triumphant  return 
to  his  home  and  friends,  now  the  sweet  vision  abruptly  dis- 
pelled, and  the  gibbet  and  executioner  staring  him  in  the  face 
—  Larry's  countenance  exhibited  a  picture  of  heroical  immo- 
bility. Once,  and  once  only,  when  the  evidence  was  rushing 
in  a  full  tide  against  him,  some  signs  of  mortal  trepidation 
overcast  his  visage.  The  blood  in  his  cheeks  took  fright  and 
fled  —  a  cold  perspiration  burst  from  his  brow.  His  lips  be 
came  glued  together.  His  sister,  whose  eyes  were  riveted 
upon  him,  as  she  hung  from  the  dock-side,  extended  her  arm, 
and  applied  a  piece  of  orange  to  his  mouth.  He  accepted  the 
relief,  but,  like  an  exhausted  patient,  without  turning  aside 
to  see  by  whose  hand  it  was  administered.  At  this  crisis 
of  his  courage,  a  home-thrust  from  O'Oonnell  floored  the  wit- 
ness who  had  so  discomposed  his  client ;  the  public  buzzed 
their  admiration,  and  Larry  was  himself  again.  The  case  for 
the  crown  having  closed,  the  prisoner's  counsel  announced 
that  he  would  call  no  witnesses.  Larry's  friends  pressed  hard 
to  have  one,  at  least,  of  the  alibis  proved.  The  counsel  was 
inflexible,  and  they  reluctantly  submitted. 

The  case  went  to  the  jury  loaded  with  hanging  matter,  but 
still  not  without  a  saving  doubt.  After  long  deliberation,  the 
doubt  prevailed.     The  jury  came  out,  and  the  glorious  sound 


larry's  triumph.  37 

of"  not  guilty,"  announced  to  Larry  Cronan  that,  for  this  time, 
lie  had  miraculously  escaped  the  gallows.  He  bowed  with 
undissembled  gratitude  to  the  verdict.  He  thanked  the  jury. 
He  thanked  "  his  lordship's  honor."  He  thanked  his  counsel 
—  shook  hands  with  the  jailer  —  sprung  at  a  bound  over  the 
dock,  was  caught  as  he  descended  in  the  arms  of  his  friends, 
and  hurried  away  in  triumph  to  the  precincts  of  the  court.  I 
saw  him  a  few  minutes  after,  as  he  was  paraded  through  the 
main  street  of  the  town  on  his  return  to  his  barony.  The 
sight  was  enough  to  make  one  almost  long  to  have  been  on 
the  point  of  being  hanged.  The  principal  figure  was  Larry 
himself,  advancing  with  a  firm  and  buoyant  step,  and  occa- 
sionally giving  a  responsive  flourish  of  his  cudgel,  which  he 
had  already  resumed,  to  the  cheerings  and  congratulations 
amid  which  he  moved  along.  At  his  sides  were  his  wife  and 
sister,  each  of  whom  held  the  collar  of  his  coat  firmly  grasped, 
and,  dragging  him  to  and  fro,  interrupted  his  progress  every 
moment,  as  they  threw  themselves  upon  him,  and  gave  vent  to 
their  joy  in  another  and  another  convulsive  hug.  A  few 
yards  in  front,  his  old  mother  bustled  along  in  a  strange  sort 
of  a  pace,  between  a  trot  and  a  canter,  and  every  now  and 
then,  discovering  that  she  had  shot  too  far  ahead,  pirouetted 
round,  and  stood  in  the  centre  of  the  street,  clapping  her 
withered  hands  and  shouting  out  her  ecstasy  in  native  Irish, 
until  the  grouv  came  up,  and  again  propelled  her  forward.  A 
cavalcade  of  neighbors,  and  among  them  the  intended  alibi 
witnesses,  talking  as  loud  and  looking,  as  important  as  if  their 
perjury  had  been  put  to  the  test,  brought  up  the  rear.  And 
such  was  the  manner  and  form  in  which  Larry  Cronan  was 
reconducted  to  his  household  gods,  who  saw  him  that  night 
celebrating,  in  the  best  of  whiskey  and  bacon,  the  splendid 
issue  of  his  morning's  pitched  battle  with  the  law.* 

*  Phillips  relates  that  at  the  assizes  of  Enniskillen,  Plunket  once  defended 
a  horse-stealer  with  such  consummate  tact,  that  one  of  the  fraternity,  in  a  par- 
oxysm of  delight,  burst  into  an  exclamation,  "  Long  life  to  you,  Plunket !  The 
first  horse  I  steal,  boys,  by  Jekurs,  I'll  have  Plunket!"  John  O'Connell  tells 
an  anecdote  of  his  father,  which  is  worth  repeating.  He  defended  a  man 
charged  with  highway  robbery,  and  by  an  able  cross-examination  procured  his 
acquittal.     Next  year,  at  the  assizes  of  the  same  town,  he  had  to  defend  tho 


38  AN    IUISII    CIRCUIT. 

The  profusion  of  crime  periodically  appearing  upon  the  Irish 
calendars,  wears,  it  must  be  admitted,  a  very  tremendous  as- 
pect;  quite  sufficient  to  deter  the  British  capitalist  from  trust- 
ing his  wealth  within  its  reach.  Yet,  from  the  observations  I 
have  had  an  opportunity  of  making,  I  am  greatly  inclined  to 
think  that  instances  of  pure,  unmitigated,  unprovoked  invasion 
of  life  and  property  Avould  be  found  (every  requisite  compari- 
son being  made)  to  be,  upon  the  whole,  less  frequent  than  in 
England.  The  hardened,  adroit,  and  desperate  English  felon, 
embracing  and  persevering  in  crime  as  a  means  of  bettering 
his  condition,  is  a  character  that,  with  the  exception  of  two  or 
three  of  the  capital  towns,  has  few  counterparts  in  Ireland. 
The  Irish  peasantry  have  unquestionably  increased  in  fierce- 
ness within  the  last  twenty  or  thirty  years ;  yet,  as  far  as  out- 
rages upon  property  for  the  sake  of  gain  are  concerned,  it  is 
never  the  genius  of  a  people  so  poor  and  contented  with  so  lit- 
tle, and  that  little  so  easily  procured,  to  become  gratuitous 
thieves  and  highwaymen.  They  have  too  little  taste  for  even 
the  necessaries  of  life  to  risk  their  necks  for  its  luxuries.  At 
seasons  of  unusual  pressure,  and  under  circumstances  of  pecu- 
liar excitement,  they  are  less  abstinent ;  but  even  then  they 
violate  the  laws  in  numbers  and  as  partisans,  and  their  mur- 
ders and  depredations  have  more  the  character  of  a  political 
revolt  than  of  a  merely  felonious  confederacy.  In  truth,  it 
may  be  almost  said  that,  in  the  southern  districts  of  Ireland, 
the  only  constituted  authentic  organ  of  popular  discontent  is 
midnight  insurrection.  If  rents  are  too  high,  if  the  tithe-proc 
tor  is  insatiable,  if  agents  are  inexorable  and  distrain  with 
undue  severity,  the  never-failing  Captain  Rock  instanter  takes 

same  man,  under  charge  of  having  committed  a  burglary,  with  violence  nearly 
amounting  to  murder.  The  jury  discredited  the  Government  witnesses,  could 
not  agree  on  a  verdict,  and  the  prisoner  was  discharged.  Again,  O'Gonnell 
had  to  defend  him  —  this  time  on  a  charge  of  piracy — by  demurring  to  the 
jurisdiction  of  the  Court,  the  offence,  committed  "  on  the  high  seas,"  being 
cognizable  only  before  an  Admiralty  Court.  When  the  man  saw  his  successful 
counsel  turn  round  to  the  dock,  in  which  he  stood,  he  stretched  over  to  him, 
and,  raising  eyes  and  hands  most  piously  and  fervently  to  heaven,  cried  out, 
"  Oh,  Mi.  O'Connell,  may  the  Lord  spare  you  —  to  me  '" — M. 


CRIMINAL    GALLANTRY.  39 

the  field  witli  liis  nocturnal  forces,*  issues  Lis  justificatory  mani- 
festoes, levies  arms  and  ammunition  upon  the  gentry,  burns  a 
few  obnoxious  tenements,  murders  a  police-magistrate  or  two, 
and  thus  conveys  to  the  public  his  diosatisfation  with  a  state 
of  things,  which  (supposing  them  possible  to  exist  in  any  quar- 
ter of  England)  would  be  bloodlessly  laid  before  the  nation  for 
reprobation  and  redress,  in  a  series  of  well-penned  letters  to  the 
editor  of  the  "Morning  Chronicle. "t 

There  is,  however,  one  particular  felony,  always  figuring 
conspicuously  upon  an  Irish  calendar,  which  I  rather  fear  that 
a  genuine  son  of  St.  Patrick  has  a  natural  predisposition  to 
commit  for  its  own  sake.  Irishmen  the  most  sensitive  for  the 
honor  of  their  country,  must,  I  think,  admit  that  among  them 
a  youthful  admirer  of  the  fair  sex,  with  a  hot-spring  of  true 
Milesian  blood  in  his  veins,  is  disposed  to  be  rather  abrupt  and 

*  The  spirit  of  Irish  disaffection  (put  down  by  Mr.  O'Connell,  who  showed  that 
it  actually  supplied  the  Government  with  good  grounds  for  making  and  enforcing 
harsh  laws)  found  numerous  leaders  in  the  south  and  west  of  Ireland,  most  of 
whom  assumed  the  soubriquet  of  "  Captain  Rock."  The  forces  under  the  com- 
mand of  these  leaders  were  generally  called  "  Whiteboys,"  from  their  common 
practice  of  wearing  white  shirts  over  their  usual  garments  during  their  noctur- 
nal excursions.  Thomas  Moore,  who  has  apostrophized  him  as  "  the  genius  of 
Riot,"  wrote  the  Memoirs  of  Captain  Rock,  in  which,  with  more  truth  than 
poetry,  he  thus  briefly  stated  the  causes  of  Irish  discontent  :— 
"  As  long  as  Ireland  shall  pretend, 

Like  sugar-loaf,  turned  upside  down, 

To  stand  upon  its  smaller  end, 

So  long  shall  live  old  Rock's  renown. 

As  long  as  Popish  spade  and  scythe 

Shall  dig  and  cut  the  Sassenagh's  tithe ; 

And  Popish  purses  pay  the  tolls, 

On  heaven's  road,  for  Sassenagh  souls  — 

As  long  as  Millions  shall  kneel  down 

To  ask  of  Thousands  for  their  own, 

While  Thousands  proudly  turn  away, 

And  to  the  Millions  answer,  '  Nay  !'  — 

So  long  the  merry  reign  shall  be 

Of  Captain  Rock  and  his  family."  —  M. 
t  In  1825,  when  this  sketch  was  published,  the  "  Morning  Chronicle"  had 
nearly  as  much  influence,  in   and  out  of  London,  as  The  Times,  and  was  tlu» 
great  organ  of  the  liberal  pa^'y  in  England  and  Ireland. —  M. 


4:0  AN    IRTStl    CXRCtTlT. 

peremptory  toward  the  object  of  Lis  adoration.  And  yet  among 
all  the  various  cases  that  are  tried  at  an  Irish  assizes,  those  in 
which  "  ladies  are  recommended  to  leave  the  court"  are  per- 
haps the  most  perplexing  to  a  judge  and  jury.*  If,  on  the  one 
hand,  the  Hibernian  lover  be  often  hasty  and  irregular  in  his 
style  of  courtship ;  on  the  other,  the  beauties  of  the  bogs  (let 
Mr.  O'Oonnell  deny  it  as  he  will)  are  sometimes  frail :  and, 
besides,  the  charge  is  in  itself  so  easily  made,  and  so  difficult 
to  refute- — still  it  may  in  any  given  case  be  true  ;  and  the  wit- 
nesses depose  to  their  wrongs  in  such  heart-rending  accents, 
and  weep,  and  sigh,  and  faiut  away,  so  naturally  —  but  then 
so  many  instances  occur  in  which  all  this  turns  out  to  be  im- 
posture;  and  the  complainant  has  always  so  many  motives  to 
swear  to  her  own  purity  through  thick  and  thin,  and  the  bound- 
ary between  import unacy  and  felony  is  so  undefinable,  and  she 
is  in  general  so  ready  to  consent,  that,  after  all,  the  affair  shall 
terminate,  like  a  modern  comedy,  in  a  marriage,  for  in  nine 
cases  out  of  ten  it  is  almost  impossible  to  divine  whether  the 
real  object  of  the  prosecutrix  is  the  prisoner's  life,  or  his  hand 
and  fortune.  The  party  accused  (whenever  in  point  of  fact  he 
can  do  so)  suspects  it  to  be  the  latter  ;  and  it  is  often  amusing 
enough  to  watch  his  deportment,  as  influenced  by  that  impres- 
sion, throughout  the  progress  of  his  trial. 

At  first  he  takes  his  station  at  the  bar  with  the  confident  and 

*  In  England  it  is  the  rule  for  ladies  to  attend  the  assizes,  in  Ireland  it  is 
the  exception.  At  any  place,  the  practice  is  absurd  and  indelicate.  The  fair 
sex  who  visit  the  Courts  of  Law,  listening  for  hours  to  evidence  and  speeches 
which  they  could  take  no  interest  in,  even  if  they  understood  them,  evidently 
go  to  exhibit  their  charms  and  —  their  wardrobe  !  An  aggravated  murder  case 
pleases  them  —  as  a  tragedy  would.  But  their  peculiar  delight  is  to  listen  to 
the  details  of  an  action  for  breach  of  promise  of  marriage.  In  cases  of  seduc- 
tion and  crim.  con.,  the  crier  of  the  Court  gives  a  preliminary  warning  "ladies 
and  boys  will  leave  the  Court."  I  recollect  one  of  these  cases,  in  which  the 
bulk  of  the  petticoated  spectators  did  not  vacate  their  seats  —  their  prurient 
curiosity  was  predominant.  In  stating  the  facts,  the  prosecuting  counsel,  see- 
ing ladies  in  Court,  and  not  wishing  to  wound  their  sense  of  delicacy,  hesitated 
for  woids  in  which  to  wrap  up  the  necessaiy  grossness  of  the  details.  "  Broth- 
er." said  the  Judge,  "  as  all  the  modest  women  have  left  the  Court,  you  may 
call  things  by  their  proper  names."  Then  followed  a  great  fluttering  of  bon- 
net-plumes, and,  in  five  minutes  after  the  reproof,  the  fair  sex  had  left  thm 
Court!  — M. 


GETTING    A    WIFE    "  ON    TRIAL."  41 

somewhat  swaggering  air  of  a  man  determined  not  to  be  bullied 
by  a  capital  prosecution  into  a  match  against  his  taste.  It  is 
in  vain  that  the  prosecutrix  apprizes  him,  by  her  softened  and. 
half- for  giving  glances,  and  her  tender  reluctance  to  swear  too 
hard  at  first,  that  if  he  says  but  the  word  she  is  ready  "to 
drop  the  business,"  and  fly  into  his  arms.  In  vain  his  friends 
and  hers  endeavor  to  impress  upon  him  the  vast  difference  in 
point  of  comfort  and  respectability  between  life  with  a  wife 
and  home,  and  the  premature  abridgment  of  his  days  upon 
gibbet.  "No;  his  mind  is  made  up,  and  he'll  run  all  chances 
and  if  she  only  tells  the  whole  matter  just  as  it  happened,  and 
might  happen  to  anybody,  not  a  hair  of  his  head  has  cause  to 
be  afear'd."  This  lasts  for  a  time  ;  but  as  the  case  in  its  prog- 
ress begins  to  wear  a  serious  aspect,  and  the  countenance  of 
his  attorney  to  assume  along  with  it  a  disastrous  gravity,  won- 
drous is  the  revolution  of  sentiment  that  is  gradually  but  rap- 
idly produced.  She,  upon  whom  a  little  while  ago  he  frowned 
in  scorn,  on  a  sudden  begins  to  find  favor  in  his  sight.  With 
every  step  that  her  gentle  hand  conducts  him  toward  his  doom, 
he  becomes  more  conjugally  inclined.  The  more  the  thicken- 
ing danger  compels  him  to  reconsider  his  determination,  the 
more  clearly  he  sees  that  after  all  it  will  be  better  to  receive 
his  "death  from  her  eyes"  than  from  her  tongue;  until  at 
length,  being  fairly  led  to  the  foot  of  the  gallows,  with  the  rope, 
in  such  cases  the  most  potent  of  love- chains,  fast  about  his  neck, 
he  announces  himself  the  repentant  lover,  tenders  the  amende 
honorable,  and  is  transferred  with  all  convenient  speed  from  the 
impending  gripe  of  the  hangman  to  the  nuptial  clasp  of  a  young 
and  blooming  bride.  Such  matches  can  hardly  be  said  to  be 
"  made  in  heaven  ;"  yet  I  have  never  heard  that  they  turn  out 
less  prosperously  than  others.  The  wife  is  all  gratitude  and 
pride  for  having  been  "  made  an  honest  woman  ;"  the  husband 
is  usually  bound  over  at  the  time  of  the  marriage  to  keep  the 
peace  toward  the  mistress  of  his  soul;  and,  with  these  collat- 
eral securities  for  domestic  bliss,  they  generally  contrive  to 
live  on,  and  defy  Mr.  Malthus,  with  as  much  harmony  as  if 
their  fates  had  been  united  by  a  less  circuitous  process.* 

*  There  is  a  difference  of  opinion  among  the  judges  as  to  the  expediency  of 
^rmitting  a  prosecution  to  be  stopped  in  the  manner  above  described.     The 


4:2  AN   IRISH   CIRCUIT. 

These  are  things  to  smile  at;  but  exhibitions  of  a  far  differ- 
ent character  occasionally  occur  —  not,  as  already  stated,  more 
frequently  than  elsewhere,  but  when  they  do  appear,  present- 
ing instances  of  deep  aboriginal  depravity,  for  which  no  politi- 
cal or  social  palliation  can  be  found.  Nor  is  it  exclusively 
from  among  the  refuse  of  the  community  that  such  examples 
may  be  taken.  Of  this  I  have  before  me  a  remarkable  illus- 
tration in  the  details  of  a  case  that  happened  a  few  years  ago, 
and  which,  in  addition  to  the  singularity  of  the  incidents,  has 
the  novelty  of  being  now  for  the  first  time  presented  in  a 
printed  form  to  the  public* 

The  river  Shannon,  in  its  passage  westward  toward  the 
Atlantic,  expands,  about  forty  miles  below  the  city  of  Lim- 
erick, into  a  capacious  sheet  of  water  resembling  an  estuary, 
and  making  a  distance  of  ten  or  twelve  miles  from  bank  to 
bank.  At  the  northern,  or  county  of  Clare  side,  is  the  town 
of  Kilrush.  Upon  the  opposite  shore,  adjoining  the  borders 
of  the  counties  of  Limerick  and  Kerry,  is  the  town  of  Tarbert ; 
and  a  few  miles  higher  up  the  stream  the  now  inconsiderable 
village  of  Glyn  —  the  same  from  which  a  branch  of  the  Fitz- 
geralds  originally  took  their  ancient  and  still-honored  title  of 
"Knights  of  Glyn."  None  of  these  places  make  any  kind  of 
show  upon  the  banks,  which  besides  are  pretty  thickly  planted 
almost  down  to  the  water's  edge.     The  river  itself  in  this  part 

question  is  full  of  difficulty ;  but  all  things  considered,  it  would  probably  be 
more  salutary,  to  let  the  law  in  every  instance  take  its  course.  If  an  indul- 
gence, which  originated  in  humanity,  often  saves  a  court  and  jury  from  a  dis- 
tressing duty,  it,  on  the  other  hand,  has  a  tendency  to  encourage  interested 
prosecutions  and  also  to  render  the  actual  commission  of  the  crime  more  fre- 
quent, by  holding  out  to  offenders  the  possibility  of  such  a  means  of  escape  in 
the  last  resort.  [At  present,  and  for  many  years  past,  a  prosecution  for  abduc- 
tion once  brought  before  a  jury  is  not  allowed  to  be  stopped  —  except  for  want 
of  evidence.  The  result  is  that  the  offence  has  scarcely  been  heard  of  latter- 
ly.-M.] 

*  Upon  the  inci  lents  here  related,  with  a  graphic  clearness  and  force  most 
touching  in  their  naked  simplicity,  the  late  Gerald  Griffin,  himself  a  "  Limer- 
ick man,"  founded  "  The  Collegians,"  his  most  striking  and  truthful  work  of 
fiction.  The  original  of  his  "  Hardress  Cregan"  was  John  Scanlai.,  whose 
name  was  not  published  by  Mr.  Sheil,  out  of  respect  for  the  feelings  of  hi» 
family,  one  of  the  most  respectable  in  the  South  of  Ireland. — M. 


A   MYSTERIOUS    MtJRDER.  43 

presents  few  signs  of  human  intercourse.  In  the  finest  summer 
weather  the  eye  may  often  look  round  and  search  in  vain  for 
a  single  bank  or  boat  to  break  the  solitude  of  the  scene.  The 
general  desolation  is  in  fact  at  times  so  complete,  that  were 
an  adept  in  crime  to  be  in  quest  of  a  place  where  a  deed 
of  violence  might  be  perpetrated  under  the  eye  of  God  alone, 
he  could  not  select  a  fitter  scene  than  the  channel  of  the  river 
Shannon,  midway  between  the  points  I  have  just  described. 

One  morning,  a  little  after  sunrise,  about  the  latter  end  of 
July,  in  the  year  1819,  two  poor  fishermen,  named  Patrick 
Connell  and  ....  Driscol,  who  lived  at  Money-Point,  a  small 
hamlet  near  Kilrush,  went  down  to  the  river-side,  according  to 
their  custom,  to  attend  to  their  occupation.  As  they  walked 
along  the  strand  in  the  direction  of  their  boat,  they  came  upon 
a  human  body  which  had  been  washed  ashore  by  the  last  tide. 
It  was  the  remains  of  a  young  female,  and  had  no  clothing  or 
covering  of  any  kind  excepting  a  small  bodice.  Who  or  what 
she  had  been  they  could  not  conjecture,  but  how  she  came  by 
her  death  was  manifest.  They  found  a  rope  tied  at  one  end 
as  tightly  as  possible  round  the  neck,  and  at  the  other  present- 
ing a  large  loop,  to  which  they  supposed  that  a  stone  or  some 
other  weight  had  been  attached,  until  the  working  of  the 
stream  had  caused  it  to  separate.  From  the  general  state  of 
the  body,  and  more  particularly  from  the  teeth  having  almost 
all  dropped  out,  they  concluded  that  it  must  have  been  under 
the  water  for  several  weeks.  After  a  short  consultation,  the 
two  fishermen  resolved  upon  proceeding  without  delay  to  Kil- 
rush, to  apprize  the  civil  authorities  of  the  circumstance;  but 
in  the  meantime  they  could  not  bear  to  think  of  leaving  the 
remains  exposed  as  they  had  found  them  on  the  shore,  and 
liable  to  be  borne  away  again  by  the  tide  before  they  could 
return.  They  accordingly  removed  the  body  to  a  little  dis- 
tance beyond  high-water  mark,  and  gave  it  a  temporary  inter- 
ment. The  feelings  with  which  they  performed  this  office  were 
marked  by  that  tender  and  reverential  regard  toward  the  dead 
which  distinguishes  the  Irish  peasantry.  Upon  the  subsequent 
investigations,  it  became  of  importance  to  ascertain  whether 
the  burial  had  been  conducted  in  such  a  manner  as  not  to  have 


44  AN    IRISH    CIRCUIT. 

occasioned  any  additional  injmy  or  disfigurement  to  the  re« 
mains;  and  Patrick  Connell  being  asked  the  question,  replied 
in  a  tone  of  voice  so  pathetic  as  to  bring  a  tear  into  every  eye «. 
"  No,"  said  the  poor  fellow,  raising  both  his  hands,  and  attempt- 
ing to  convey  by  their  movements  the  gentleness  that  had  been 
used,  "it  was  impossible  for  anything  we  did  to  injure  or  dis- 
figure her,  for  Ave  laid  her  up  neatly  in  sea-weeds,  and  then 
covered  her  all  round  softly  with  the  sand,  so  that  nothing 
could  harm  her." 

The  magistrates  of  the.  neighborhood  having  ascertained 
from  the  report  of  the  fishermen  that  a  dreadful  crime  had  been 
committed,  set  immediate  inquiries  on  foot  for  the  discovery  of 
the  offender.  The  task  could  not  have  devolved  upon  a  more 
competent  class  of  men.  Whatever  other  failings  may  have 
been  imputed  to  the  Irish  country-gentlemen,  indifference  or 
inexpertness  in  the  detection  of  criminals  has  not  been  among 
them.  Time  out  of  mind,  the  political  and  social  anomalies 
of  Ireland  have  kept  that  body  continually  on  the  aiert  for  the 
protection  of  their  lives  and  properties.  To  the  abstract  prin- 
ciple of  public  duty  and  general  love  of  justice,  has  been  super- 
added the  more  pressing  stimulus  of  self-preservation.  The 
consequence  is,  that  their  local  information  in  all  that  can  re- 
late to  the  discovery  of  a  public  offender  is  singularly  accurate 
and  extensive  ;  and  equally  remarkable  are  their  skill  and  zeal 
in  putting  every  resource  in  play  for  the  attainment  of  theii 
object*  The  exertions  of  the  magistrates  in  the  present  in- 
stance were  so  successful,  that  a  considerable  mass  of  circum- 

*  Liberal  pecuniary  rewards  for  prosecuting  to  conviction,  are  among1  the 
number;  but  experience  has  shown  that  in  such  a  country  as  Ireland,  this  may 
be  a  very  dangerous  expedient.  A  striking  instance  occurred  a  few  years  ago 
A  young  gentleman,  the  son  of  an  unpopular  English  agent,  was  barbarously 
murdered.  The  reward  offered,  amounted  to  some  hundreds  of  pounds.  Foi 
some  time  no  evidence  was  tendered;  at  length  a  boy,  about  thirteen  years  of 
age,  and  whose  parents  were  in  the  most  indigent  circumstances,  presented 
himself  and  stated  that  he  had  witnessed  the  murder  from  a  concealed  position 
behind  a  hedge,  and  that  he  could  identify  one  of  the  persons  engaged  in  it 
by  a  particular  mark  on  one  of  his  cheeks.  From  the  description,  suspicion 
lighted  upon  a  particular  man,  who  was  accordingly  apprehended,  and  being 
shown  to  the  boy,  was  pronounced  by  him  to  be  the  very  person.  On  the  trial, 
the  boy,  the  only  material  witness,  gave  his  evidence  so  clearly  and  positively. 


A    MYSTERIOUS    MURDER.  45 

stantial  evidence  was  in  readiness  for  the  coronei's  jury,  that 
was  summoned  to  inquire  into  the  identity  of  the  deceased  and 
the  cause  of  her  death.  The  details  were  voluminous,  and  I 
shall  therefore  select  only  the  most  striking  and  material. 

The  most  important  and  ample  information  was  communi- 
cated by  a  young  woman  named  Ellen  Walsh.  A  few  weeks 
before  the  finding  of  the  remains,  this  person  being  at  Kilrush, 
went  down  to  the  river-side  in  search  of  a  passage  across  to 
Glyn,  where  she  resided  in  service  with  a  lady.  It  was  then 
approaching  sunset.  Upon  arriving  at  the  shore,  she  found  a 
small  pleasnre-boat  on   the   point  of  putting  off  for  Tarbert. 

Six  persons  were  in  the  boat,  a  Mr.  S ,  a  young  woman 

who   was   addressed    as   Mrs.    S ,    Stephen   Sullivan,   Mr. 

S 's  servant,  and  three  boatmen  of  the  town  of  Kilrush. 

There  was  also   on  board   a  trunk  belonging  to  Mrs.  S . 

The  only  one  of  the  party  of  whom  Ellen  Walsh  had  any  pre- 
vious knowledge  was  Sullivan,  whose  native  place  was  Glyn; 
and,  upon  addressing  herself  to  him  for  a  passage  across,  she 
was  permitted  to  enter  the  boat.  They  immediately  got  under 
weigh,  expecting  to  reach  Tarbert  before  dark  ;  but  before 
they  had  proceeded  any  distance  on  their  way  across,  they 
discovered  that  this  was  impracticable.  In  addition  to  an  ad- 
verse tide,  it  came  on  to  blow  so  hard  against  them  that  the 
boat  made  little  or  no  way,  so  that  they  were  kept  out  upon 
the  water  the  whole  of  the  night.  Toward  morning  a  heavy 
shower  of  rain  fell,  but,  the  wind  having  moderated,  the  rowers 
succeeded  in  reaching  a  small  place  below  Tarbert,  called 
Carrickafoyle.  Here  the  party  landed  as  the  day  began  to 
dawn,  and,  taking  the  trunk  along  with  them,  proceeded  to  a 
small  public-house  in  the  village,  to  dry  themselves  and  ob- 
tain refreshment.  After  breakfast,  the  boatmen,  who  had 
been  hired  for  the  single  occasion  of  rowing  the  boat  across 
the  river,  were  dismissed  and  returned   toward  their  homes. 

and  sustained  the  ordeal  of  a  cross-examination  so  successfully,  that  the  most 
incredulous  could  scarcely  question  his  veracity.  The  prisoner,  however,  was 
fortunately  able  to  prove  an  alibi,  and  escaped.  A  few  months  after,  the  real 
criminal,  who  had  a  mark  on  one  of  his  cheeks,  was  apprehended,  tried,  and 
convicted  upon  evidence  beyond  all  imputation 


46  AN    IRISH    CIRCUIT. 

The  boat,  which  (it  afterward  appeared)  had  been  purchased 

a  few  days  before  by  Mr.  S ,  remained.     Shortly  after  the 

departure  of  the  boatmen,  Mr.  S and  Sullivan  went  out 

(they  said  to  search  for  change  of  a  note),  and  were  absent 

about  an  hour,  leaving  Mrs.  S and  Ellen  Walsh  together 

in  the  public-house.  And  here  it  was  that  some  particulars 
observed  by  the  latter,  Avhen  subsequently  recalled  to  her  rec- 
ollection and  disclosed,  became  of  vital  moment  as  matters  of 
circumstantial  evidence. 

It  has  been  already  stated,  that  the  body  found  by  the 
fishermen,  Avas  without  any  covering  save  a  small  bodice  ;  so 
that  no  direct  evidence  of  identity  could  be  established  by 
ascertaining  what  particular  dress  Mrs.  S wore;  but  indi- 
rectly, a  knowledge  of  this  fact  (as  will  appear  in  the  sequel), 
became  of  the  first  importance.  Upon  this  subject  Ellen 
Walsh  was  able  to  give  some  minute  and  accurate  infor- 
mation.    She  had  forgotten  the  color  of  the  gown  Mrs.  S 

wore  when  they  landed  at  Carrickafoyle,  but  she  well  remem- 
bered that  she  had  on  a  gray  cloth  mantle  lined  with  light  blue 
silk,  and  with  welts  of  a  particular  fashion  in  the  skirts.  She 
also  wore  a  pink-colored  silk  handkerchief  round  her  neck, 
and  had  on  her  finger  two  gold  rings  —  one  plain,  the  other 
carved.     These  Ellen  Walsh  had  observed  and  noted  before 

Mr.  S and   his  servant  left  the  public-house;   but  during 

their   absence,  Mrs.  S opened  the  trunk,  and,  with  the 

natural  vanity  of  a  young  female,  exhibited  for  her  admiration 
several  new  articles  of  dress  which  it  contained.  Among 
other  things,  there  were  two  trimmed  spencers  —  one  of  green, 
the  other  of  yellow  silk;  two  thin  muslin  frocks — one  plain, 
the  other  worked  ;  and  a  green  velvet  reticule  trimmed  with 
gold  lace. 

Upon  the  return  of  Mr.  S and  Sullivan  to  the  public- 
house,  the  weather  having  now  cleared,  they  proposed  to  Mrs. 

S to  go  on  board  the  boat.     Ellen  Walsh,  understanding 

that  Tarbert  was  their  destination,  desired  to  accompany 
them  ;  but  Sullivan,  taking  her  aside,  recommended  to  her  to 
remain  where  she  was  until  the  following  morning,  adding  (and 
this  last  observation  was  in  the  hearing  of  his  master),  that  in 


ACCUMULATED    EVIDENCE.  47 

the  meantime  "  they  would  get  rid  of  that  girl  (Mrs.  S )," 

and  then  return  and  convey  her  to  Glyn.  This  Ellen  Walsh 
declined,  and  followed  the  party  to  the  beach,  entreating  to  be 
at  least  put  across  to  the  other  side  of  a  certain  creek  there, 
which  would  save  her  a  round  of  several  miles  on  her  way 
homeward.  At  first  they  would  not  consent,  and  put  off  with- 
out her  ;  but  seeing  her  begin  to  cry,  Mr.  S and  Sullivan, 

after  a  short  consultation,  put  back  the  boat,  and  taking  her  in, 
conveyed  her  across  the  creek,  and  landed  her  about  three 
miles  below  the  town  of  Glyn.  They  then  sailed  away  in  the 
direction  of  the  opposite  shore,  and  she  proceeded  home- 
ward. 

Early  next  morning  Ellen  Walsh,  having  occasion  to  go  out 
upon  some  errand,  was  surprised  to  see  Sullivan  standing  at 
the  door  of  his  mother's  house  in  Glyn.    She  entered  the  house, 

and  the  first  thing  she  perceived  was  Mrs.  S 's  trunk  upon 

the  floor.     She   asked    if  Mrs.  S was  in  Glyn.     Sullivan 

replied  that  "  she  was  not;  that  they  had  shipped  her  off  with 
the  captain  of  an  American  vessel."  Two  or  three  days  after, 
Ellen  Walsh  saw  upon  one  of  Sullivan's  sisters  a  gray  man- 
tle, which  she  instantly  recognised  as  the  one  Mrs.  S had 

worn  at  Oarrickafoyle.     There  was  a  woman  at  Glyn,  named 

Grace   Scanlon,  with  whom  Mr.  S ,  when  he  went  there, 

was    in   the  habit   of  lodging.     In   this  person's  house  Ellen 
♦Valsh   some  time  after  saw  the  silk  handkerchief,  one  of  the 

spencers,  and    the  two   muslin  frocks  which  Mrs.  S had 

shown  her  at  Oarrickafoyle.  (These,  it  appeared  from  other 
evidence,  had  been  sold  to  Grace  Scanlon  by  Sullivan,  who 
accounted  to  her  for  their  coming  into  his  possession,  by  stating 

that  Mrs.  S had  run  away  from  Kilrush  with  an  officer,  and 

left  her  trunk  of  clothes  behind  her.)  Finally,  about  a  fort- 
night after  the    disappearance   of  Mrs.   S ,  Ellen  Walsh, 

going   one  evening   into    Grace    Scanlon 's    house,   found  Mr. 

S and   Sullivan  sitting  there.     The  former  had  on  one 

of  his  fingers  a   gold   carved   ring,  precisely  resembling  that 

worn  by  Mrs.  S .     They  both  were  under  the  influence  of 

liquor,  and  talked  much  and  loud.  Among  other  things,  Sul- 
livan asked  his  master  for  some  money  ;  and  on  being    efused, 


4:8  AN    IRISH    CIRCUIT. 

observed  emphatically,  "  Mr.  John,  you  know  I  have  as  good 
a  right  to  that  money  as  you  have." 

Such  were,  in  substance,  the  most  material  facts  (excepting 
one  particular  hereafter  mentioned),  that  had  fallen  under 
Ellen  Walsh's  observation  ;  and,  upon  the  magistrates  being 
apprized  that  she  had  such  evidence  to  give,  she  was  summon- 
ed as  a  witness  upon  the  inquest.  She  accordingly  attended, 
and  accompanied  the  coroner's  jury  to  the  place  where  the 
remains  had  been  deposited  by  the  fishermen.  The  circum- 
stances she  detailed  were  pregnant  with  suspicion  against  Mr. 

S and  his  servant.     A  young  and  defenceless  female  had 

disappeared.  Upon  the  last  occasion  of  her  having  been 
seen,  she  was  in  their  company,  in  an  open  boat  on  the  river 
Shannon.  A  declaration  had  been  made  by  the  servant, 
"  that  she  was  to  be  got  rid  of."  On  the  very  next  day  her 
trunk  of  clothes  is  seen  in  their  possession,  and,  soon  after,  a 
part  of  the  dress  she  wore  in  the  boat  on  the  servant's  sister, 
and  one  of  her  rings  on  the  master's  finger  ;  add  to  this  the 
mysterious  allusion  to  the  money  —  "Mr.  John,  you  know  I 
have  as  good  a  right  to  that  money  as  you  have."  A  few 
weeks  after,  a  body  is  washed  ashore,  near  to  the  place  where 
this  young  woman  had  been  last  seen  —  the  body  of  a  young 
female,  who  had  manifestly  been  stripped,  and  murdered,  and 
flung  into  the  river,  and  exhibiting  symptoms  of  decay  (ac- 
cording to  the  report  of  the  fishermen),  that  exactly  tallied 
with  the  time  of  her  suspected  death. 

On  the  other  hand,  there  were  some  circumstances  in  thtj  case, 
as  detailed  by  Ellen  Walsh,  which  justified  the  magistrates  in 
considering  that  a  jury  should  pause  before  they  pronounced 
her  evidence  to  be  conclusive.  Of  Sullivan  they  had  no  knowl- 
edge ;  but  his  master  they  knew  to  be  a  young  gentleman  of 
some  territorial  property,  of  respectable  parentage,  and  nearly 
allied  by  blood  with  more  than  one  of  the  noble  families  of 
Ireland.  This  naturally  compelled  them  to  entertain  some 
doubts.  Then  upon  the  supposition  that  he  and  his  servant 
had  concerted  the  murder  of  the  young  woman  Ellen  Walsh 
had  seen  with  them,  what  could  have  been  more  clumsy  and 
incautious  than  tlieir  previous  and  subsequent  conduct?     The 


CONFLICTING    TESTIMONY.  4:9 

inference  from  her  story  of  the  transaction  was,  that  the  time 
and  manner  of  executing  their  deadly  purpose  were  finally  de- 
termined upon  during  their  absence  from  the  public-house  at 
Oarrickafoyle.  Yet  the  first  thing  they  do  upon  their  return  is 
to  inform  her,  without  any  kind  of  necessity  for  the  communi- 
cation, "  that  they  want  to  get  rid  of  that  girl"  — a  declaration 
consistent  enough  with  their  subsequent  account  of  her  disap- 
pearance, but  almost  incredible  if  considered  as  a  gratuitous 
disclosure  by  persons  meditating  the  perpetration  of  an  atro- 
cious crime.  They  next  permit  the  same  person  (as  if  deter- 
mined that  she  should  be  a  future  witness  against  them)  to  see 
them  bearing  away  their  victim  to  the  very  scene  of  execution; 
and,  finally,  they  appear  the  next  day  in  the  town  of  Glyn, 
and  publicly  exhibit  themselves  and  the  evidences  of  their 
crime  to  the  very  person  from  whose  scrutiny  and  observation, 
upon  the  supposition  of  their  guilt,  they  must  have  known  they 
had  so  much  to  apprehend  ! 

These  conflicting  views  did  not  escape  the  attention  of  the 
magistrates  who  had  undertaken  the  investigation  of  this  affair. 
They  saw  that  the  case  would  continue  involved  in  mystery, 
unless  it  could  be  unequivocally  made  to  appear  that  the  young 
woman  seen  by  Ellen  Walsh  and  the  murdered  person  were 
the  same.  For  this  purpose,  before  they  allowed  the  body  to 
be  disinterred  for  the  inspection  of  the  jury,  they  used  the  pre- 
caution of  re-interrogating  Ellen  Walsh,  as  to  every  the  minu- 
test particular  she  could  recall  respecting  the  personal  appear- 
ance of  Mrs.  S .     The  witness  stated  she  was  extremely 

young,  not  more,  she  imagined,  than  fifteen  or  sixteen,  and 
that  her  figure  was  short  and  slight.  So  far  her  description 
corresponded  with  that  of  the  fishermen,  who  were  also  in  at- 
tendance; but  this  would  have  been  too  feeble  and  general 
evidence  of  identity  for  a  court  of  criminal  inquiry  to  act  upon 

with  safety.     The  witness  farther  stated  that  Mrs.  S was 

remarkably  handsome,  and  gave  the  coroner's  jury  a  minute 
description  of  her  face ;  but  no  comparison  of  feature  could 
now  be  availing.  In  the  remains  over  which  the  investigation 
was  holding,  every  natural  lineament  of  the  countenance  must 
long  since  have   been   utterly   effaced   by   death,  and  by   the 

Voi,.  I— 3 


50  AN    IRISH    CIRCUIT. 

equally  disfiguring  operation  of  the  element  to  which  they  had 
been  exposed.  At  length,  however,  the  Avitness  distinctly  re- 
called to  her  recollection  one  peculiarity  about  Mrs.  S 's 

face,  which,  if  she  and  the  deceased  were  the  same,  might  still 
be  visible.  The  teeth  A&ere  not  perfectly  regular.  Two  of  the 
upper  row  (one  at  cadi  side)  projected  considerably.  This  im- 
portant clew  having  been  obtained,  the  remains  were  disinter- 
red, and  found  in  the  condition  which  the  fishermen  had  de- 
scribed. The  mouth  was  of  course  the  first  and  chief  object 
of  minute  inspection.  The  teeth  of  the  upper  jaw  had  all 
dropped  out ;  but  upon  a  careful  examination  of  the  sockets,  two 
of  the  side  ones  were  found  to  be  of  such  a  particular  formation  as 
satisfied  the  jury  that  the  teeth  belonging  to  them  must  of  ne- 
cessity have  projected  as  the  witness  represented.  Upon  this 
fact,  coupled  with  the  other  particulars  of  her  testimony,  they 
returned  a  verdict,  finding  that  the  deceased  had  been  wilfully 

murdered  by  John  S and   Stephen  Sullivan.     Warrants 

were  immediately  issued  for  the  apprehension  of  the  parties  ac- 
cused, neither  of  whom  (and  this  was  not  an  immaterial  circum- 
stance) had  been  seen  in  public  since  the  finding  of  the  remains 
on  the  shore.  The  servant  succeeded  in  concealing  himself. 
The  master  was  traced  to  a  particular  farmhouse  in  the  county 
of  Limerick,  and  followed  thither  by  the  officers  of  justice, 
accompanied  by  a  party  of  dragoons.  They  searched  the 
place  ineffectually,  and  were  retiring  as  from  a  fruitless  pur- 
suit, when  one  of  the  dragoons,  as  he  was  riding  away,  stuck 
his  sabre,  more  in  sport  than  otherwise,  into  a  heap  of  straw 
that  lay  near  the  house.  The  sword  met  with  no  resistance, 
and  the  dragoon  had  already  passed  on,  when  a  figure  burst  from 

beneath  the  straw  and  called  out  for  mercy.     It  Avas  Mr.  S . 

From  some  passages  in  the  statement  of  Ellen  Walsh,  it  was 
sufficiently  obvious  that  the  deceased  could  not  have  been  the 
Avife  of  Mr.  S ,  and  who  she  had  been,  remained  to  be  dis- 
covered. Before  the  lapse  of  many  days,  this  point  Avas  ascer- 
tained. There  was  an  humble  man  named  John  Oonroy,  who 
had  folloAved  the  trade  of  a  shoemaker  in  one  of  the  small 
towns  of  the  county  of  Limerick.  Tbis  person  had  humanely 
protected  an  orphan  niece  (named  Ellen  Hanlon),  and  brought 


THE    TRIAL   OF   SCANLAN.  51 

her  up  from  her  infancy  in  his  house  as  one  of  his  own  chil- 
dren, till  she  attained  her  sixteenth  year.  She  was  uncom- 
monly handsome,  and,  as  he  imagined,  equally  modest  and 
trustworthy.  Her  uncle*,  who  it  appeared  was  an  honest,  in- 
dustrious man,  was  in  the  habit  of  obtaining  credit  to  a  con 
siderable  amount  for  articles  in  the  way  of  his  trade  from  the 
wholesale  dealers  in  Cork,  which  he  regularly  visited  once  a 
year  for  the  purpose  of  discharging  his  engagements  for  the 
preceding,  and  obtaining  a  fresh  supply  for  the  ensuing  year. 
A  few  weeks  before  the  circumstances  above  detailed,  Oonroy 
was  about  to  proceed  to  Cork  according  to  his  annual  custom. 
He  had  then  in  his  house  one  hundred  pounds  in  notes,  and 
twelve  guineas  in  gold.  On  the  Sunday  preceding  his  intend- 
ed departure,  while  he  was  at  mass,  Ellen  Hanlon  disappeared, 
and  along  with  her  the  whole  of  his  money.     He  never  heard 

of  her  after,  neither  had  he  any  knowledge  of  Mr.  S ,  but, 

from  the  description  given  of  the  young  woman  who  had  been 
with  him  on  the  Shannon,  and  more  particularly  from  the  coinci- 
dence of  the  peculiarity  about  the  teeth,  he  was  assured  that 
his  niece  must  have   been   the  person,  and   was   accordingly 

produced   as   a  witness  for  the  crown  upon  Mr.  S 's  trial. 

The  disclosure  of  these  new  facts,  though  it  might  have  dimin- 
ished in  some  degree  the  public  sympathy  for  the  fate  of  the 
victim,  had  a  proportionate  effect  in  aggravating  every  senti- 
ment of  horror  against  the  prisoner,  by  superadding  the  crimes 
of  seduction  and  robbery  to  murder. 

The  trial  came  on  at  the  ensuing  assizes  for  the  county  of 
Limerick.  A  clear  case  of  circumstantial  evidence,  consisting 
mainly  of  the  foregoing  facts,  was  made  out  against  the  pris- 
oner, who  had  nothing,  save  the  ingenuity  of  his  counsel,  to 
offer  in  his  defence.  When  the  issue  was  handed  up  to  J^fe 
jury,  it  was  supposed  that  they  would  return  a  A^erdict  of  con- 
viction without  leaving  the  box;  but,  contrary  to  expectation, 
they  retired,  and  continued  long  engaged  in  consultation.  1  lie 
populace,  who  watched  the  proceedings  with  extraordinary 
interest,  murmured  at  the  delay.  This  was  by  no  means  a 
usual  or  characteristic  sentiment;  but  at  this  particular  period, 
and   in  this   particular  county,  the   minds  of  the  lower  orders 


52  AN    IRISH    CIRCUIT. 

were  already  in  rapid  progress  toward  that  point  of  political 
excitation,  which  soon  after  exploded  in  a  formidable  insurrec- 
tion. Against  the  culprit  or  the  crime  they  might  have  felt  in 
the  abstract  no  peculiar  indignation  j  but  he  was  a  protestant 
and  a  gentleman,  and  they  naturally  contrasted,  the  present 
hesitation  to  convict  with  the  promptitude  that,  as  they  con- 
sidered, would  have  been  manifested  had  such  evidence  been 
adduced  against  any  one  of  them.  At  length,  late  in  the 
evening,  a  verdict  of  guilty  was  found.  Sentence  of  death  was 
pronounced,  and  the  prisoner  ordered  for  execution  on  the  next 
day  but  one  succeeding  his  conviction. 

Some  very  unusual  incidents  followed.  Before  the  judge 
left  the  bench,  he  received  an  application,  sanctioned  by  some 
names  of  consideration  in  the  county,  and  praying  that  he 
would  transmit  to  the  viceroy  a  memorial  in  the  prisoner's 
favor.  The  judge,  feeling  the  case  to  be  one  where  the  law 
should  sternly  take  its  course,  refused  to  interfere.  He  was 
then  solicited  to  permit  the  sentence  to  be  at  least  respited  to 
such  a  time  as  would  enable  those  interested  in  the  prisoner's 
behalf  to  ascertain  the  result  of  such  an  application  from  them- 
selves. To  this  request  the  same  answer  was,  for  the  same 
reasons,  returned.  There  being,  however,  still  time,  if  expedi- 
tion were  used,  to  make  the  experiment,  a  memorial,  the  pre- 
cise terms  of  which  did  not  publicly  transpire,  was  that  even- 
ing despatched  by  a  special  messenger  to  the  seat  of.  govern- 
ment. This  proceeding  was  the  subject  of  much  and  varied 
commentary.  By  some  it  was  attributed  to  the  prisoner's  prot- 
estations of  innocence  —  for  he  vehemently  protested  his  inno- 
cence; by  others  to  particular  views  and  feelings,  in  which 
politics  predominated  ;  by  the  majority  (and  this  conjecture 
appears  to  have  been  the  true  one),  to  an  anxiety  to  avert,  if 
possible,  from  the  families  of  rank  and  influence  with  which 
the  culprit  was  allied,  the  stigma  of  an  ignominious  execution. 

The  hour  beyond  which  the  law  had  said  that  this  guilty 
young  man  should  not  be  permitted  to  exist,  was  now  at  hand, 
and  the  special  messenger  had  not  returned.  Yet,  so  confident 
were  the  prisoner's  friends  that  tidings  of  mercy  were  on  the 
way,  that  the  sheriff  humanely  consented  to  connive  at  every 


DYING   GAME.  .  53 

possible  procrastination  of  the  dreadful  ceremony.  He  had 
already  lived  for  more  than  two  hours  beyond  his  appointed 
time,  when  an  answer  from  the  castle  of  Dublin  arrived.  Its 
purport  was,  to  bid  him  prepare  for  instant  death.  I  have 
heard  from  a  gentleman  wh?  visited  his  cell  a  few  minutes 
after  this  final  intimation,  tha^  his  composure  was  astonishing. 
His  sole  anxiety  seemed  to  be,  to  show  that  he  could  die  with 
firmness.  An  empty  vial  was  lying  in  the  cell — "You  have 
been  taking  laudanum,  I  perceive,  sir,"  said  the  gentleman. 
"I  have,"  he  replied,  "but  not  with  the  object  that  you  sus- 
pect. The  dose  was  not  strong  enough  for  that  —  I  merely 
took  as  much  as  would  steady  my  nerves."  He  asserted  his 
innocence  of  all  participation  in  the  murder  of  Ellen  Hanlon, 
and  declared  that,  if  ever  Sullivan  should  be  brought  to  trial, 
the  injustice  of  the  present  sentence  would  appear. 

The  friends  of  the  prisoner  were,  for  many  and  obvious 
reasons,  desirous  that  he  should  be  conveyed  in  a  close  car- 
riage to  the  place  of  execution.  Expecting  a  reprieve,  they 
had  neglected  to  provide  one,  and  they  now  found  it  impossible 
to  hire  such  a  conveyance.  Large  sums  were  offered  at  the 
different  places  where  chaises  and  horses  were  to  be  let ;  but 
the  popular  prejudice  prevailed.*  At  last  an  old  carriage  was 
found  exposed  to  sale,  and  purchased.     Horses  were  still  to  be 

*  It  is  considered  in  Ireland,  that  whoever  lends  or  hires  cattle  or  convey- 
ance at  an  execution  participates  in  the  abhorred  vocation  of  the  hangman. 
Before  the  "  drop"  was  invented,  the  condemned  was  usually  conveyed  to  the 
gallows  in  a  cart,  sitting  on  his  coffin  —  unless  it  were  part  of  his  punishment 
•.hat  "  his  body  be  handed  over  to  the  surgeons  for  dissection."  The  finisher 
of  the  law,  having  adjusted  the  fatal  rope  on  "  the  horse  that  was  foaled  of  an 
acorn"  (see  Ainsworth's  Jack  Sheppard),  and  round  the  neck  of  the  doomed 
man,  whom  he  placed  standing  in  the  cart,  used  to  descend  on  terra  fir  ma,  take 
hold  of  the  horse's  head,  draw  away  the  cart,  and  thus  give  the  death-fall  to 
his  victim.  If  any  other  person  led  the  horse  away,  the  disgrace  of  having 
virtually  acted  as  executioner  would  cling  to  him  through  life.  As  I  am  on 
the  subject,  I  may  add  that  "  Jack  Ketch"  is  a  nom-de-corde  used  only  in 
England.  The  Irish  nick-name,  no  matter  what  the  true  appellation,  is 
"Canty  the  hangman,"  and  the  miserable  wretch  is  compelled,  out  of  regard 
for  his  personal  safety,  to  reside  n  prison.  If  recognised  out  of  doors,  his  life 
would  not  be  worth  half-an-hour's  purchase,  so  great  is  the  popular  detestation 
of  his  trade  of  legal  murder. — M. 


54  AN   IRISH    CIRCUIT. 

provided,  when  two  turf-carts,  belonging  to  tenants  of  the  pris- 
oner, appeared  moving  into  the  town.  The  horses  were  taken 
from  under  the  carts,  and  harnessed  to  the  carriage.  To  this 
the  owners  made  no  resistance;  but  no  threats  or  entreaties 
could  induce  either  of  them  to  undertake  the  office  of  driver. 
After  a  further  delay  occasioned  by  this  difficulty,  a  needy 
wretch  among  the  bystanders  was  tempted  by  the  offer  of  a 
guinea  to  take  the  reins  and  brave  the  ridicule  of  the  mob. 
The  prisoner,  accompanied  by  the  jailer  and  clergyman,  was 
put  into  the  carriage,  and  the  procession  began  to  advance. 
At  the  distance  of  a  few  hundred  yards  from  the  jail,  a  bridge 
was  to  be  passed.  The  horses,  which  had  shown  no  signs  of 
restiffness  before,  no  sooner  reached  the  foot  of  the  bridge 
than  they  came  to  a  full  stop.  Beating,  coaxing,  cursing  —  all 
were  unavailing;  not  an  inch  beyond  that  spot  could  they  be 
made  to  advance.  The  contest  between  them  and  the  driver 
terminated  in  one  of  the  horses  deliberately  lying  down  amid 
the  cheers  of  the  mob.  To  their  excited  apprehensions,  this 
act  of  the  animal  had  a  superstitious  import.  It  evinced  a 
preternatural  abhorrence  of  the  crime  of  murder  —  a  miraculous 
instinct  in  detecting  guilt,  which  a  jury  of  Irish  gentlemen  had 
taken  hours  to  pronounce  upon. 

Every  effort  to  get  the  carriage  forward  having  failed,  the 
prisoner  was  removed  from  it,  and  conducted  on  foot  to  the 
place  of  execution.  It  was  a  solemn  and  melancholy  sight  as 
he  slowly  moved  along  the  main  street  of  a  crowded  city,  en- 
vironed by  military,  unpitied  by  the  populace,  and  gazed  at 
with  shuddering  curiosity  from  every  window.  For  a  while 
the  operation  of  the  laudanum  he  had  drunk  was  manifest. 
There  was  a  drowsy  stupor  in  his  eye  as  he  cast  it  insensibly 
around  him.  Instead  of  moving  continuously  forward,  every 
step  he  made  in  advance  seemed  a  distinct  and  laborious  effort. 
Without  the  assistance  of  the  jailer  and  clergyman  who  sup- 
ported him  between  them,  he  must,  to  all  appearance,  have 
dropped  on  the  pavement.  These  effects,  however,  gradually 
subsided,  and  before  he  arrived  at  the  place  of  execution  his 
frame  had  resumed  its  wonted  firmness.  The  conduct  of  the 
prisoner  in  his  last  moments  had  nothing  remarkable;  yet  it 


VALUE    OF   DYING    DECLARATIONS.  55 

suggests  a  few  remarks,  and  furnishes  a  striking  illustration 
upon  a  subject  of  some  interest  as  connected  with  the  adminis- 
tration of  justice  in  Ireland. 

In  that  country  an  extraordinary  importance  is  attached  to 
dying  declarations.  In  cases  exciting  any  unusual  interest,  no 
sooner  is  a  convicted  person  Landed  over  to  the  executioner, 
than  lie  is  beset  on  all  sides  with  entreaties  to  make  what  is 
jailed  a  last  satisfaction  to  justice  and  to  the  public  mind,  by 
*n  open  confession  of  his  guilt.  As  between  the  convict  and 
the  law,  such  a  proceeding  is  utterly  nugatory.  If  he  denies 
his  guilt,  he  is  not  believed;  if  he  admits  it,  he  only  admits 
a  fact  so  conclusively  established,  as  to  every  practical  pur- 
pose, that  any  supplemental  corroboration  is  superfluous.  If 
the  verdict  of  a  jury  required  the  sanction  of  a  confession,  no 
sentence  could  be  justifiably  executed  in  any  case  where  that 
sanction  was  withheld.  But  this  could  not  be.  In  submitting 
the  question  of  guilt  or  innocence  to  the  process  of  a  public 
trial,  we  apply  the  most  efficacious  method  that  our  laws  have 
been  able  to  devise  for  the  discovery  of  the  truth.  The  result, 
like  that  of  all  other  questions  depending  upon  human  testi- 
mony, may  be  erroneous.  The  condemned  may  be  a  martyr; 
for  juries  are  fallible  :  but,  for  the  purposes  of  society,  their 
verdict  must  be  final,  except  upon  those  rare  occasions  where 
its  propriety  is  subsequently  brought  into  doubt  by  new  evi- 
dence, emanating  from  a  less  questionable  source  than  that  of 
the  party  most  interested  in  arraigning  it. 

Then,  as  far  as  regards  the  satisfaction  of  the  public  mind 
with  the  justice  of  the  conviction  (for  upon  this  great  stress  is 
also  laid),  the  public  should  never  be  encouraged  to  require  a 
higher  degree  of  certainty  than  the  law  requires.  But  the 
practice  of  harassing  convicts  for  a  confession  before  the 
crowds  assembled  to  witness  their  execution,  produces  this 
effect.  —  It  teaches  them  to  divert  their  attention  from  the  best 
and  only  practical  test  of  a  question  that  should  no  longer  be 
at  issue,  and  to  set  a  value  upon  a  test  the  most  deceptive 
that  can  be  imagined.  A  voluntary  admission  of  guilt  may, 
to  be  sure,  be  depended  on  ;  but,  after  conviction,  no  kind  of 
reliance  can  be  placed  upon  the  most  solemn  asseverations  to 


56  AN   IRISH    CIRCUIT. 

the  contrary.  Deatli  and  eternity  are  dreadful  things;  and  it 
is  dreadful  to  think  of  wretches  determined  to  brave  them  with 
a  deliberate  falsehood  upon  their  lips  ;  yet  there  are  men  — 
many — that  have  the  nerve  to  do  this.  In  Ireland  it  is  of 
frequent  occurrence  ;  particularly  in  cases  of  conviction  for 
political  offences,  and,  more  or  less,  in  all  others.  A  regard 
for  posthumous  reputation  —  the  false  glory  of  being  remem- 
bered as  a  martyr  —  a  stubborn  determination  to  make  no 
concession  to  a  system  of  laws  that  he  never  respected  —  con- 
cern for  the  feelings  and  character  of  relatives,  by  whom  a 
dying  protestation  of  innocence  is  cherished,  and  appealed 
to  as  a  bequest  to  the  honor  of  a  family-name :  these  and 
similar  motives  attend  the  departing  culprit  to  the  final  scene, 
and  prevail  to  the  last  over  every  suggestion  of  truth  and 
religion.  It  was  so  in  the  case  I  am  now  narrating.  At  the 
place  of  execution,  the  prisoner  was  solemnly  adjured  by  the 
clergyman  in  attendance  to  admit  the  justice  of  his  sentence  : 
he  as  solemnly  re-asserted  his  innocence.  The  cap  was  drawn 
over  his  eyes,  and  he  was  about  to  be  thrown  off.  An  acci- 
dental interruption  occurred.  The  clergyman  raised  the  cap, 
and  once  more  appealed  to  him  as  to  a  person  upon  whom  the 
world  had  already  closed.  The  answer  was :  "I  am  suffer- 
ing for  a  crime  in  which  I  never  participated.  If  Sullivan  is 
ever  found,  my  innocence  will  appear." 

Sullivan  was  found  before  the  next  assizes,  when  he  was  tried 
and  convicted  upon  the  same  evidence  adduced  against  his 
master.  Sullivan  was  a  catholic  ;  and  after  his  conviction 
made  a  voluntary  and  full  confession.  It  put  the  master's 
guilt  beyond  all  question.  The  wretched  girl,  according  to 
his  statement,  had  insisted  upon  retaining  in  her' own  hands 
one  half  of  the  sum  of  which  she  had  robbed  her  uncle.  To 
obtain  this,  and  also  to  disembarrass  himself  of  an  incum- 
brance, her  seducer  planned  her  death.  Sullivan  undertook 
to  be  the  executioner.  After  setting  Ellen  Walsh  on  shore, 
they  returned  to  an  unfrequented  point  near  Oarrickafoyle, 
where  the  instrument  of  murder,  a  musket,  and  a  rope,  lay 
concealed.  With  these  and  the  unsuspecting  victim,  Sullivan 
put  out  in  the  boat.     The  master  remained  upon  the  strand. 


A   POPULAR   BELIEF.  57 

After  the  interval  of  an  hour,  the  boat  returned,  bearing  back 
Ellen  Hanlon  unharmed.  "  I  thought  I  had  made  up  my 
mind,"  said  the  ruffian  in  his  penitential  declaration;  "I 
was  just  lifting  the  musket  to  dash  her  brains  out  —  hut  when 
I  looked  in  her  innocent  face,  I  had  not  the  heart  to  do  it."  This 
excuse  made  no  impression  upon  the  merciless  master.  Sul- 
livan was  plied  with  liquor,  and  again  despatched  upon  the 
murderous  mission;  the  musket  was  once  more  raised,  and  — 
the  rest  has  been  told.* 

*  It  may  be  mentioned  as  a.  striking  instance  of  the  belief  in  the  declaration 
(made  by  no  less  a  person  than  Lord  Redesdale,  who  had  been  Irish  lord- 
chancellor),  "  in  Ireland  there  is  one  law  for  the  rich,  and  another  for  the 
poor,''  that  there  are  yet  hundreds  in  the  county  of  Limerick,  who  were  present 
at  this  execution,  and  seriously  believed  that  it  was  not  Mr.  Scanlan  who  was 
hanged,  but  some  other  prisoner  who  was  rendered  unconscious  by  means  o:' 
strong  narcotics.  It  was  currently  reported  that,  because  he  was  a  gentleman, 
Scanlan  was  allowed  to  escape  to  the  United  States,  where  he  eventually  came 
to  a  violent  death !  It  is  notorious  that  after  the  public  execution  of  Fauntle- 
roy,  the  London  banker,  for  forgery,  a  motion  for  delay,  in  some  case  where 
u  large  amount  of  property  was  involved,  was  actually  made  in  one  of  the  law- 
courts  at  Westminster,  grounded  in  an  affidavit  that  Fauntleroy  was  alive  in 
America,  and  that  a  commission  should  be  sent  over  to  take  his  examination 
as  a  witness.  The  motion  was  refused,  as  the  fact  of  his  continued  existence 
was  not  positively  sworn  to,  but  it  is  surprising  that  the  lawyer  who  made,  and 
the  judge  who  heard  the  motion,  should  have  forgotten  the  plain  and  undoubted 
fact,  that  having  been  capitally  condemned,  Fauntleroy  was  dead  in  law,  ani 
Lis  evidence,  therefore,  qulAe  valueless. — M. 

3* 


HALL  OF  THE  FOUR  COUUTS,  DUBLIN 

The  law,  and  the  practice  of  the  courts,  in  Ireland,  are,  with 
some  trivial  exceptions,  precisely  the  same  as  in  England  ;* 
but  the  system  of  professional  life  in  Ireland  is  in  some  respects 
different.  I  allude  to  the  custom,  which  the  Irish  bar  have 
long  since  adopted,  of  assembling  daily  for  the  transaction  of 
business,  or  in  search  of  it,  if  they  have  it  not,  in  the  "  Hall 
of  the  Four  Courts,"  Dublin.  The  building  itself  is  a  splendid 
one.  Like  the  other  public  edifices  of  Dublin  (and  I  might 
add,  the  private  ones),  it  is  an  effort  of  Irish  pride,  exceeding 
far  in  magnificence  the  substantial  wealth  and  civilization  of 
the  country.  In  the  centre  of  the  interior,  and  overcanopied 
by  a  lofty  dome,  is  a  spacious  circular  hall,  into  which  the  sev- 
eral courts  of  justice  open. 

I  was  fond  of  lounging  in  this  place.  From  the  hours  of 
twelve  to  three  it  is  a  busy  and  a  motley  scene.  When  I 
speak  of  it  as  the  place  of  daily  resort  for  the  members  of  the 
legal  profession  and  their  clients,  I  may  be  understood  to  mean 
that  it  is  the  general  rendezvous  of  the  whole  community ;  for 
in  Ireland  almost  every  man  of  any  pretensions  that  you  meet, 
is  either  a  plaintiff  or  defendant,  or  on  the  point  of  becoming 
so,  and,  when  in  Dublin,  seldom  fails  to  repair  at  least  once  a 
day  to  "  the  Hall,"  in  order  to  look  after  his  cause,  and,  by 
conferences  with  his  lawyers,  to  keep  up  his  mind  to  the  true 

*  There  are  no  regular  reports  of  the  Irish  cases.  All  the  new  authorities 
are  imported  from  England ;  so  that  the  accident  of  a  fair  or  foul  wind  may 
sometimes  affect  the  decision  of  a  cause.  "Are  you  sure,  Mr.  PJunket,"  said 
Lord  Manners,  one  day,  "  that  what  you  have  stated  is  the  law  ?" — "  It  unques- 
tionably was  the  law  half  an  hour  ago,"  replied  Mr.  P.  pulling  out  his  watch, 
"  but  by  this  time  the  packet  has  probably  arrived,  and  I  shall  not  be  positive." 


HtJBBUB    IN    THE    COURTS,.  59 

litigating  temperature.  It  is  here,  too,  that  the  political  idlers 
of  the  tow n  resort,  to  drop  or  pick  up  the  rumors  of  the  day. 
There  is  also  a  plentiful  admixture  of  the  lower  orders,  among 
whom  it  is  not  difficult  to  distinguish  the  country-litigant. 
You  know  him  by  his  mantle  of  frieze,  his  two  boots  and  one 
spur;  by  the  tattered  lease,  fit  emblem  of  his  tenement,  which 
he  unfolds  as  cautiously  as  Sir  Humphrey  Davy  would  a  man- 
uscript of  Herculaneum  ;  and,  best  of  all,  by  his  rueful  visage, 
in  which  you  can  clearly  read  that  some  clause  in  the  last 
ejectment-act  lies  heavy  on  his  heart. 

These  form  the  principal  materials  of  the  scene  ;  but  it  is  not 
so  easy  to  enumerate  the  manifold  and  ever-shifting  combina 
tions  into  which  they  are  diversified.  The  rapid  succession 
of  so  many  objects,  passing  and  repassing  eternally  before  you, 
perplexes  and  quickly  exhausts  the  eye.  It  fares  still  worse 
with  the  ear.  The  din  is  tremendous.  Besides  the  tumult  of 
some  thousand  voices  in  ardent  discussion,  and  the  most  of 
them  raised  to  the  declamatory  pitch,  you  have  ever  and  anon 
the  stentorian  cries  of  the  tipstaffs,  bawling  out,  "  The  gentle- 
men of  the  special  jury  to  the  box  !"  or  the  still  more  thrilling 
vociferations  of  attorneys  or  attorneys'  clerks,  hallooing  to  a 
particular  counsel  that  "  their  case  is  called  on,  and  all  is  lost  if 
he  delays  an  instant !"  Whereupon  the  counsel,  catching  up 
the  sound  of  his  name,  wafted  through  the  hubbub,  breaks  pre- 
cipitately from  the  circle  that  engages  him,  and  bustles  through 
the  throng,  escorted,  if  he  be  of  any  eminence,  by  a  2J0Sse  °f 
applicants,  each  claiming  to  monopolize  him,  until  he  reaches 
the  entrance  of  the  court,  and,  plunging  in,  escapes  for  that 
time  from  their  importunate  solicitations. 

The  bustle  among  the  members  of  the  bar  is  greatly  in- 
creased by  the  circumstance  of  them  all,  with  very  few  excep- 
tions, practising  in  all  the  courts.*     Hence  at  every  moment 

*  The  custom  that  prevails  in  Ireland,  of  counsel  dividing  themselves  among 
the  several  courts,  produces,  particularly  in  important  cases,  an  inconvenience 
similar  to  one  that  Cicero  complains  of  as  peculiar  to  the  Roman  forum  in  his 
day  —  the  multiplicity  of  ad-\ocates  retained  upon  each  trial,  and  the  absence 
of  some  of  them  dining  parts  of  the  proceedings  upon  which  they  have  after- 
ward to  comment. 


SO  HALL   OF   THE   FOUR   COURTS,    DUBLIN. 

you  see  tlie  most  eminent  darting  across  the  hall,  flushed  and 
palpitating  from  the  recent  conflict,  and,  no  breathing-time  al- 
lowed them,  advancing  with  rapid  strides  and  looks  of  fierce 
intent,  to  fling  themselves  again  into  the  thick  of  another  fight. 
It  daily  happens  that  two  cases  are  to  be  heard  in  different 
courts,  and  in  which  the  same  barrister  is  the  client's  main 
support,  are  called  on  at  the  same  hour.  On  such  occasions  it 
is  amusing  to  witness  the  contest  between  the  respective  attor- 
neys to  secure  their  champion. 

Mr.  O'Connell,  for  instance,  who  is  high  in  every  branch  of 
his  profession,  and  peculiarly  in  request  for  what  is  termed 
"battling  a  motion,"  is  perpetually  to  be  seen,  a  conspicuous 
figure  in  this  scene  of  clamor  and  commotion,  balancing  be- 
tween two  equally  pressing  calls  upon  him,  and  deploring  his 
want  of  ubiquity.  The  first  time  he  was  pointed  out  to  me, 
he  was  in  one  of  these  predicaments,  suspended  like  Garrick 
in  the  picture  between  conflicting  solicitations.  On  the  one 
side  an  able-bodied,  boisterous  catholic  attorney,  from  the 
county  of  Kerry,  had  laid  his  athletic  gripe  upon  "  the  coun- 
sellor," and  swearing  by  some  favorite  saint,  was  fairly  hauling 
him  along  in  the  direction  of  the  Exchequer ;  on  the  other  side 
a  more  polished  town-practitioner,  of  the  established  faith, 
pointed  with  pathetic  look  and  gesture  to  the  Common  Pleas, 
and  in  tones  of  agony  implored  the  learned  gentleman  to  re- 
member that  "  their  case  was  actually  on,  and  that  if  he  were 
not  at  his  post,  the  court  would  grant  the  motion,  costs  and  all, 
against  their  client."  On  such  occasions  a  counsel  has  a  deli- 
cate task ;  but  long  habit  enables  him  to  assume  a  neutrality, 
if  he  has  it  not.  In  the  instance  alluded  to,  I  could  not  suffi- 
ciently admire  the  intense  impartiality  manifested  by  the  sub- 
ject of  contention  toward  each  of  the  competitors  for  his  learned 
carcass;  but  the  physical  force  of  the  man  from  Kerry,  aided 
perhaps  by  some  local  associations  —  for  the  counsellor  is  a 
"  Kerry-man"  himself — prevailed  over  all  the  moral  wooing 
of  his  rival,  and  he  carried  off  the  prize. 

The  preceding  are  a  few  of  the  constant  and  ever-acting 
elements  of  noise  and  motion  in  this  busy  scene;  but  an  extra 
sensation  is  often  given  to  the  congregated  mass.     The  detect 


LEGAL    PERSON  AG  KS.  61 

tion  of  a  pickpocket  (I  am  not  speaking  figuratively)  causes  a 
sudden  and  impetuous  rush  of  heads,  with  wigs  and  without 
them,  to  the  spot  where  the  culprit  has  been  caught  hi  flagrante. 
At  other  times  the  scene  is  diversified  by  a  group  of  fine  girls 
from  the  country,  coming,  as  they  all  make  a  point  of  doing,  to 
see  the  courts,  and  show  themselves  to  the  junior  bar.  A 
crowd  of  young  and  learned  gallants  instantaneously  collects, 
and  follows  in  their  wake  :  even  the  arid  veteran  will  start 
from  his  legal  revery  as  they  pass  along,  or,  discontinuing  the 
perusal  of  his  deeds  and  counterparts,  betray  by  a  faint  leer 
that,  with  all  his  love  of  parchment,  a  fine  skin,  glowing  with 
the  tints  that  life  and  nature  gave  it,  has  yet  a  more  pre- 
vailing charm.  Lastly,  I  must  not  omit  that  the  Hall  is  not 
unfrequently  thrown  into  "  confusion  worse  confounded"  by  that 
particular  breach  of  his  majesty's  Irish  peace,  improperly 
called  a  "horsewhipping."  When  an  insult  is  to  be  avenged, 
this  place  is  often  chosen  for  its  publicity  as  the  fittest  scene 
of  castigation. 

But  this  scene,  though  at  first  view  the  emblem  of  inextrica- 
ble confusion,  will  yet,  when  frequently  contemplated,  assume 
certain  forms  approaching  to  regular  combination  :  thus,  after 
an  attendance  of  a  few  days,  if  you  perambulate  the  arena,  or 
stand  upon  some  elevated  point  from  which  you  can  take  in 
the  whole,  you  will  recognise,  especially  among  the  members 
of  the  bar,  the  same  individuals,  or  classes,  occupied  or  grouped 
in  something  like  an  habitual  manner.  On  the  steps  outside 
the  entrance  to  the  Court  of  Chancery,  your  eye  will  probably 
be  caught  by  the  imposing  figure  and  the  courteous  and  manly 
features  of  Bushe,*  waiting  there  till  his  turn  comes  to  refute  some 
long  winded  argument  going  on  within,  and  to  which,  as  a  piece 
of  forensic  finesse,  he  affects  a  disdain  to  listen  :  or,  near  thor 
same  spot,  you  will  light  upon  the  less  social  but  more  pregnant 
and  meditative  countenance  of  Plunket,f  as  he  paces  to  and 
fro  alone,  resolving  some  matter. of  imperial  moment,  until  he 
is  roused  from  these  more  congenial  musings,  and  hurries  on  to 
court,  at  the  call  of  the  shrill-tongued  crier,  to  simplify  or  em- 

*  Charles  Kendal  Bushe,  afterward  lord  chief-justice  of  Ireland. — M> 
t  Now  Lord  riunket,  ex-lord  chancellor  of  Ireland. — 1VJ, 


62  HAIL  OF  THE  FOUR  COURTS,  DUBLIN. 

barrass  some  question  of  equitable  altercation  :  or,  if  it  be  a 
nisi-prius  day  in  any  of  the  law-courts,  you  may  observe  out- 
side, the  delight  of  Dublin  jurors,  Mr.  H.  D.  Grady,  working 
himself  into  a  jovial  humor  against  the  coming  statement,  and 
with  all  the  precaution  of  an  experienced  combatant,  squibbing 
his  "jury-eye,"  lest  it  should  miss  fire  when  he  appears  upon 
the  ground. 

Or,  to  pass  from  individuals  to  groups,  you  will  daily  find, 
and  pretty  nearly  upon  the  same  spot,  the  same  little  circles 
or  coteries,  composed  chiefly  of  the  members  of  the  junior  bar, 
as  politics,  or  community  of  tastes,  or  family  connections,  may 
bring  them  together.  Among  these  you  will  readily  distin- 
guish those  who  by  birth  or  expectations  consider  themselves 
to  be  identified  with  the  aristocracy  of  the  country  :  you  see  it 
in  their  more  fashionable  attire  and  attitudes,  their  joyous  and 
unworn  countenances,  and  in  the  lighter  topics  of  discussion 
on  which  they  can  afford  to  indulge.  At  a  little  distance  stands 
a  group  of  quite  another  stamp  —  pallid,  keen-eyed,  anxious 
aspirants  for  professional  employment,  and  generally  to  be 
found  in  vehement  debate  over  some  dark  and  dreary  point  of 
statute  or  common  law,  in  the  hope  that,  by  violently  rubbing 
their  opinions  together,  a  light  may  be  struck  at  last.  A  little 
farther  on  you  will  come  upon  another,  a  group  of  learned  veto- 
ists  and  anti-vetoists,  where  some  youthful  or  veteran  theolo- 
gian is  descanting  upon  the  abominations  of  a  schism,  with  a 
running  accompaniment  of  original  remarks  upon  the  politics 
of  the  Vatican,  and  the  character  of  Cardinal  Gonsalvi.  Close 
to  these  again  —  but  I  find  that  I  should  never  have  done,  were 
I  to  attempt  comprising  within  a  single  view  the  endless  and 
complicated  details  of  this  panoramic  spectacle,  or  to  specify 
the  proportions  in  which  the  several  subjects  discussed  'here 
respectively  contribute  to  form  the  loud  and  ceaseless  buzz  that 
rises  and  reverberates  through  the  roof. 

This  daily  assemblage  of  the  Irish  Bar,  in  a  particular  spot, 
enables  you  to  estimate  at  a  glance  the  extraordinary  numbers 
of  that  body,  and  to  perceive  what  an  enormous  excess  they 
bear  to  the  professional  occupation  which  the  country  can  by 
possibility  afford.     After  all  the  Courts  are  filled  to  the  brim, 


HOPE    DEFERRED.  63 

there  still  remains  a  legal  population  to  occupy  the  vast  arena 
without.  I  was  particularly  struck  by  the  number  of  young- 
men  (many  of  them,  I  was  assured,  possessed  of  fine  talents, 
which,  if  differently  applied,  must  have  forced  their  way)  who 
from  term  to  term,  and  year  to  year,  submit  to  "  trudge  the 
Hall,"  waiting  till  their  turn  shall  come  at  last,  and  too  often 
harassed  by  forebodings  that  it  may  never  come.  It  was  not 
difficult  to  read  their  history  in  their  looks  :  their  countenances 
wore  a  sickly,  pallid,  and  jaded  expression  ,*  the  symbols  of 
hope  deferred,  if  not  extinguished  ;  there  was  even  something, 
as  they  sauntered  to  and  fro,  in  their  languid  gait  and  unde- 
cided movements,  from  which  it  could  be  inferred  that  their 
sensations  were  melancholy  and  irksome.  I  was  for  some  time 
at  a  loss  to  account  for  this  extreme  disproportion  between  the 
supply  and  the  demand  —  so  much  greater  than  any  ever 
known  to  exist  in  England. 

During  my  stay  in  Dublin,  I  accidentally  fell  into  convex - 
sation  with  an  intelligent  Irish  gentleman,  who' in  the  early 
part  of  his  life  had   been  connected  for   some  years  with  the 

*  I  have  heard  several  medical  men  of  Dublin  speak  of  the  air  of  the  courts 
and  hall,  as  particularly  unwholesome!  Besides  the  impurity  communicatee; 
to  the  atmosphere  by  the  crowds  that  collect  there,  the  situation  is  low  and 
marshy.  The  building  is  so  close  to  the  river  Liffey,  tbat  fears  have  been  en 
tertained  for  the  safety  of  the  foundation.  Formerly,  before  the  present  quay 
was  constructed,  the  water  in  high  tides  sometimes  made  its  way  into  the  hall. 
The  mention  of  this  reminds  me  of  one  or  two  of  Curran's  jokes  : — upon  one 
occasion,  not  only  the  hall,  but  the  subterraneous  cellars  in  which  the  bar-dresses 
are  kept,  were  inundated.  When  the  counsel  went  down  to  robe,  they  found 
their  wigs  and  gown  afloat ;  Curran,  for  whom  a  cause  was  waiting  seized  the 
first  that  drifted  within  reach,  and  appeared  in  court,  dripping  like  a  river-god. 
"  Well,  Mr.  Curran,"  asked  one  of  the  judges,  "  how  did  you  leave  your  friends 
coming  on  below  ?" — "  Swimmingly,  my  lord."  In  the  course  of  the  morning, 
one  of  these  learned  friends  (who,  from  missing  his  footing,  had  come  in  for  a 
thorough  sousing)  repeatedly  protested  to  their  lordships,  that  he  should  feel 
ashamed  to  offer  such  and  such  arguments  to  the  court.  Curran,  in  reply,  com- 
plimented him  upon  his  delicacy  of  feeling,  which  he  represented  as  "  truly  a 
high  and  rare  strain  of  modesty,  in  one  who  had  just  been  dipped  in  the  Lifjeyr 
[As  an  Irishman  who  has  that  facility  of  speech  and  compliment  called  "  the 
gift  of  the  gab,"  is  usually  mentioned  as  having  kissed  the  Blame ij-sl one;  so  if 
a  native  be  particularly  impudent  (which  is  impossible,  of  course  !)  it  is  said 
that  he  has  been  dipped  in  the  IAJj'ey  —  the  river  which  runs  through  Dublin. — M. 


64  HALL    OF   THE    FOUR    COURTS,    DUBLIN. 


profession  of  the  law.  I  mentioned  what  I  had  observed,  and 
asked  for  an  explanation.  He  gave  it  pretty  nearly  as  fol- 
lows ;  I  am  inclined  to  confide  in  what  he  stated  as  substan- 
tially correct.  —  "Your  remark  is  just,  that  our  bar  is  griev- 
ously overstocked  ;  and  crowds  of  fresh  members  are  flocking 
to  it  every  term,  as  if  for  the  sole  purpose,  and  certainly  with 
the  effect,  of  starving  one  another.  If  the  annual  emoluments 
of  the  profession  were  collected  into  a  common  fund,  and 
equally  distributed  among  the  body,  the  portion  of  each  would 
not  exceed  a  miserable  pittance.  The  inordinate  preference 
for  the  profession  of  the  bar  in  Ireland  arises  from  many 
causes.  As  one  of  the  chief,  I  shall  mention  the  preposterous 
ambition  of  our  gentry,  and  their  fantastic  sensitiveness  on  the 
article  of  'family  pride.'  An  Irish  father's  first  anxiety  is  to 
give  his  son  a  calling  in  every  way  befitting  the  ancient 
dignity  of  his  name;  and  in  this  point  of  view,  the  bar  has 
peculiar  attractions.  It  is  not  merely  that  it  may,  by  possi- 
bility, lead  to  wealth,  or  perhaps,  to  a  peerage  or  a  seat  in  the 
privy  council  —  though  these  are  never  left  out  of  the  account 
—  but,  independently  of  all  this,  an  adventitious  dignity  has 
been  conferred  upon  it,  as  a  profession,  by  the  political  circum- 
stances of  the  country.  Until  the  act  of  1792,  no  Catholic 
could  become  a  barrister  :  all  the  emoluments  and  dignities 
of  the  law  were  the  exclusive  property  of  the  privileged  few ; 
and  they  were  so  considerable,  that  the  highest  families  in  the 
kingdom  rushed  in  to  share  them.  This  stamped  an  aristo- 
cratic character  and  importance  upon  the  profession.  To  be 
a  '  counsellor'  in  those  days,  was  to  be  no  ordinary  personage. 
Many  of  them  belonged  to  noble  houses  ;  many  were  men  of 
name  and  authority  in  the  state;  all  of  them,  even  the  least 
distinguished,  caught  a  certain  ray  of  glory  from  the  mere  act 
of  association  with  a  favored  class,  contending  for  the  most 
dazzling  objects  of  competition.  Much  of  this  has  passed 
away;  but  a  popular  charm,  I  should  rather  say  a  delusion, 
still  attaches  to  the  name  ;  and  parents,  duped  by  certain 
vague  and  obsolete  associations,  continue  to  precipitate  their 
sons  into  this  now  most  precarious  career,  without  the  least  ad- 
vertence to  their  substantial  prospects  of  success,  and  in  uit&r 


THE    YOUNG   BARRISTER.  65 

ignorance  of  the  peculiar  habits  and  talents  required  to  obtain 
it.  It  is  a  common  by-word  with  us,  that  '  no  one  who  really 
deserves  to  succeed  at  our  bar,  will  fail.'  This  may  be  very 
true;  but  what  a  complication  of  qualities,  what  a  course  of 
privation,  what  trials  of  taste,  and  temper,  and  pride,  are  in 
volved  in  that  familiar  and  ill-understood  assertion. 

"  A  young  barrister  who  looks  to  eminence  from  his  own 
sheer  unaided  merits,  must  have  a  mind  and  frame  prepared 
by  nature  for  the  endurance  of  unremitting  toil.  He  must 
cram  his  memory  with  the  arbitrary  principles  of  a  complex 
and  incongruous  code,  and  be  equally  prepared,  as  occasion 
serves,  to  apply  or  misapply  them.  He  must  not  only  surpass 
his  competitors  in  the  art  of  reasoning  right  from  right  prin- 
ciples—  the  logic  of  common  life;  but  he  must  be  equally  an 
adept  in  reasoning  right  from  wrong  principles,  and  wrong 
from  right  ones.  He  must  learn  to  glory  in  a  perplexing 
sophistry,  as  in  the  discovery  of  an  immortal  truth.  He  must 
make  up  his  mind  and  his  face  to  demonstrate,  in  open  court, 
with  all  imaginable  gravity,  that  nonsense  is  replete  with 
meaning,  and  that  the  clearest  meaning  is  manifestly  non- 
sense by  construction.  This  is  what  is  meant  by  'legal  habits 
of  thinking  ;'  and  to  acquire  them,  he  must  not  only  prepare 
his  faculties  by  a,  course  of  assiduous  and  direct  cultivation, 
but  he  must  absolutely  forswear  all  other  studies  and  specula- 
tions that  may  interfere  Avith  their  perfection.  There  must  be 
no  dallying  with  literature  ;  no  hankering  after  comprehensive 
theories  for  the  good  of  men  ;  away  must  be  wiped  all  such 
'trivial  fond  records.'  He  must  keep  to  his  digests  and  in- 
dexes. He  must  see  nothing  in  mankind  but  a  great  collec- 
tion of  plaintiffs  and  defendants,  and  consider  no  revolution  in 
their  affairs  as  comparable,  in  interest,  to  the  last  term  reports 
of  points  of  practice  decided  in  banco  regis.  As  he  walks  the 
streets,  he  must  give  way  to  no  sentimental  musings.  There 
must  be  no  'commercing  with  the  skies;'  no  idle  dreams  of 
love,  and  rainbows,  and  poetic  forms,  and  all  the  bright  illu- 
sions upon  which  the  'fancy  free'  can  feast.  If  a  thought  of 
love  intrudes,  it  must  be  connected  with  the  law  of  marriage 
settlements,  and  articles  of  separation  from  bed  and  board.     So 


66  HALL    OF    THE   FOUR    COURTS,   DUBLIN 


of  the  other  passions  ;  and  of  every  the  most  interesting  inci- 
dent and  situation  in  human  life  —  he  must  view  them  all  with 
reference  to  their  'legal  effect  and  operation/  If  a  funeral 
passes  by,  instead  of  permitting  his  imagination  to  follow  the 
mourners  to  the  grave,  he  must  consider  how  far  the  execu- 
tor may  not  have  made  himself  liable  for  a  waste  of  assets,  by 
some  supernumerary  plumes  and  hatbands,  beyond  '  the  state 
and  circumstances  of  the  deceased;'  —  or  if  his  eye  should 
light  upon  a  requisition  for  a  public  meeting,  to  petition  against 
a  grievance,  he  must  regard  the  grievance  as  immaterial,  but 
bethink  himself  whether  the  wording  of  the  requisition  be 
strictly  warrantable,  under  the  provisions  of  the  Convention 
Act. 

"  Such  is  a  part,  and  a  very  small  part,  of  the  probationary 
discipline  to  which  the  young  candidate  for  forensic  eminence 
must  be  prepared  to  submit ;  and  if  he  can  hold  out  for  ten  or 
fifteen  years,  his  superior  claims  may  begin  to  be  known  and 
rewarded.  But  success  will  bring  no  diminution  of  toil  and 
self-denial.  The  bodily  and  mental  labor  alone  of  a  success- 
ful barrister's  life  would  be  sufficient,  if  known  beforehand,  to 
appal  the  stoutest.  Besides  this,  it  has  its  many  peculiar  rubs 
and  annoyances.  His  life  is  passed  in  a  tumult  of  perpetual 
contention,  and  he  must  make  up  his  sensibility  to  give  and 
receive  the  hardest  knocks.  He  has  no  choice  of  cases;  he 
must  throw  himself  heart  and  soul  into  the  most  unpromising 
that  is  confided  to  him.  He  must  fight  pitched  battles  with  ob- 
streperous witnesses.  He  must  have  lungs  to  outclamor  the 
most  clamorous.  He  must  make  speeches  without  materials. 
He  must  keep  battering  for  hours  at  a  jury  that  he  sees  to  be 
impregnable.  He  is  before  the  public,  and  at  the  mercy  of 
public  opinion,  and  if  every  nerve  be  not  strained  to  the  utmost 
to  achieve  what  is  impossible,  the  public,  with  its  usual  good- 
nature, will  attribute  the  failure  to  want  of  zeal  or  capacity  in 
the  advocate  —  to  anything  rather  than  the  badness  of  the 
cause.  Finally,  he  must  appear  to  be  sanguine,  even  after  a 
defeat;  and  be  prepared  to  tell  a  knavish  client,  that  has  been 
beaten  out  of  the  courts  of  common  law,  that  his  'is  a  clear 
case  for  relief  in  equity.'     The  man  who  can  do  all  this  de- 


LEGAL    OFFICE-SEEK KliS.  67 

serves  to  succeed,  and  will  succeed;  but  unless  he  be  gifted 
with  the  rave  qualifications  of  such  men  as  Curran,*  Bushe,  and 
Plunket,  or  be  lifted  by  those  fortuitous  aids  upon  which  few 
have  a  right  to  count,  he  can  not  rationally  expect  to  arrive  at 
eminence  in  his  profession  upon  less  rigorous  conditions. 

"  Hitherto,"  continued  my  informant,  "  I  have  been  speaking 
of  such  as  come  to  the  bar  as  simply  and  solely  to  a  scene  of 
professional  exertion  ;  but  there  is  another  and  a  still  more 
numerous  class,  who  are  sent  to  it  for  the  sake  of  the  lucrative 
offices  with  which  it  abounds.  It  was  no  sooner  discovered 
that  our  bar  was  tin-influential,  and  likely,  on  occasions,  to  be 
a  troublesome  body  in  the  state,  than  the  most  decisive  meas- 
ures were  taken  to  break  it's  spirit.  Places  were  multiplied, 
beyond  all  necessity  and  all  precedent  in  England.  By  a 
single  act  of  Parliament,  two  and  thirty  judicial  offices  were 
created,  to  be  held  by  barristers  of  six  years'  standing,  and 
averaging  each  from  five  to  eight  hundred  pounds  a  year. 
This  was  one  of  the  political  measures  of  the  late  Lord  Clare,t 

*  John  Philpot  Cumin,  formerly  master  of  the  rolls  in  Ireland  (horn  in  1750, 
and  died  in  1817),  memorable  alike  for  genius  and  geniality  —  eloquence  and 
patriotism  —  wit  and  pathos.  His  forensic  exertions  in  defence  of  the  victims 
of  arbitrary  power,  during  the  closing  years  of  the  last  century,  were  alike  fear- 
less, independent,  and  chivalrous. — M. 

t  John  Fitzgibbon,  Earl  of  Clare,  who  is  described  by  Barrington  as  a  "  des 
pot  and  the  greatest  enemy  Ireland  ever  had,"  was  the  son  of  a  gentleman 
in  the  county  of  Limerick,  who  had  been  a  Roman  catholic,  and  intended  for 
a  priest,  but  changing  his  tenets,  became  an  eminent  barrister  and  member  of 
Parliament.  It  is  untrue,  as  reported,  that  Fitzgibbon  was  originally  poor  and 
of  low  birth  ;  one  of  his  sisters  married  Mr.  Jeffreys,  the  rich  owner  of  Blarney 
Castle,  and  is  immortalized  in  song  as 

" Lady  Jeffreys  who  owns  this  station. 

Like  Alexander  or  like  Helen  fair, 
There's  no  commander  throughout  the  nation, 
In  emulation  can  with  her  compare," 
and  the  other  espoused  Beresford,  Archbishop  of  Tuam.     Born  in  1749,     John 
Fitzgibbon  entered  Trinity  college,  Dublin,  in  1763,  where'he  was  in  the  same 
division  with   Henry  Grattan,  with  whom   he   competed  for  collegiate   honors, 
many  of  which  he  obtained.     It  is  not  generally  known  that,  after  obtaining  his 
B.  A.  degree,  he  was  a  member  of  Christ  Church,  Oxford,  having  been  admit- 
ted  ad  eundem,  and  became  M.  A.  of  the  English  university,  in  1770.     Admitted 
barrister,  in  Dublin,  he   speedily  obtained  extensive  practice.     His  fee-book 


68  HALL    OF    THE   FOUR    COURTS,    DUBLIN. 

an  able  lawyer,  and  excellent  private  character ;  but,  like 
many  other  sound  lawyers  and  worthy  gentlemen,  a  most 
mischievous  statesman.  He  had  felt  in  his  own  experience 
how  far  the  receipt  of  the  public  money  may  extinguish  a  sen- 
sibility to  public  abuses.  And  he  planned  and  passed  the 
bar-bill.  The  same  policy  has  been  continued  to  the  present 
day.  The  profession  teems  with  places  of  emolument;  and 
the  consequence  is,  that  every  subdivision  of  the  '  parliamen- 
tary interest'  deputes  its  representative,  to  get  forward  in  the 
ordinary  way,  as  talents  or  chance  may  favor  him,  but  at  all 
events  to  receive,  in  due  time,  his  distributive  portion  of  the 
general  patronage. 

"I  must  add,  as  highly  to  the  credit  of  the  Irish  bar,  that 
their  personal  independence,  in  the  discharge  of  their  profes- 
sional duties,  has  continued  as  it  used  to  be  in  the  best  days 
of  their  country.     The  remark  applies  to  the  general  spirit  of 

showed  that  from  June  19,  1772,  when  he  commenced  practice,  until  Decem- 
ber, 1789,  he  received  forty-five  thousand  nine  hundred  and  twelve  pounds 
sterling,  from  his  profession.  In  1782  his  income  was  six  thousand,  seven  hun- 
dred and  two  pounds  sterling.  In  1784,  he  was  appointed  Attorney-General, 
owing  his  elevation  as  much  to  his  political  support  of  the  Government,  as 
member  of  Parliament,  as  to  his  legal  merit.  On  the  death  of  Lord  Chancel- 
lor Liflford,  in  1789,  Mr.  Fitzgibbon  was  appointed  his  successor  (not  without  vio- 
lent opposition  from  Thurlow,  Chancellor  of  England,  who  contended  that  his 
Irish  birth  should  prevent  his  holding  the  highest  law-office  in  Ireland),  and 
from  that  time  until  his  death,  in  January,  1802,  was  virtually  ruler  of  Ire- 
land—  intolerant,  harsh,  and  unforgiving.  In  the  earlier  part  of  his  career, 
having  fought  a  duel  with  Mr.  Curran  (at  whom  he  took  deliberate  aim), 
he  continued  his  resentment  after  he  became  Judge,  and  let  it  be  seen,  by 
contemptuous  treatment  and  hostile  decisions,  that,  the  great  advocate  had 
not  "the  ear  of  the  Court."  In  1789,  he  was  created  Baron  Fitzgibbon,  in 
the  peerage  of  Ireland.  In  1793,  he  was  advanced  to  the  rank  of  Viscount. 
In  1795,  he  was  made  Earl  of  Clare,  and  was  created  an  English  Baron  in 
1799,  in  reward  for  his  seventy  during  the  Rebellion  of  '98.  He  was  appoint- 
ed Vice-Chancellor  of  Dublin  University,  in  1791.  Moore,  in  the  auto-bio- 
grnphical  prefaces  to  his  poems,  gives  an  interesting  account  of  the  searching 
examination  to  which  he  and  other  young  members  of  Trinity  College  were 
subjected  by  Lord  Clare  under  suspicion  of  holding  "rebellious  principles." 
Implacable  in  bis  political  and  personal  enmities,  Lord  Clare  had  few  friends. 
He  ruled  with  a  rod  of  iron,  and  for  twelve  years  was  hated  by  the  bulk  of  the 
Irish;  whom  he  so  much,  and  so  long  oppressed. — M. 


PROFESSIONAL    COURTESIES.  69 

the  entire  body.  There  may  he  exceptions  that  escaped  my 
observation ;  but  I  could  perceive  no  symptoms  of  subserviency 
— no  surrender  of  the  slightest  tittle  of  their  clients'  rights  to 
the  frowns  or  impatience  of  the  bench.  I  was  rather  struck  by 
the  peculiarly  bold  and  decisive  tone,  with  which,  when  occa- 
sions arose,  they  asserted  the  privileges  of  the  advocate. 

"  While  I  am  upon  this  subject,  I  can  not  omit  a  passing 
remark  upon  another  quality,  by  which  I  consider  the  gentle- 
men of  this  bar  to  be  pre-eminently  distinguished  —  the  invari- 
able courtesy  of  manners  which  they  preserve  amid  all  the 
hurry  and  excitement  of  litigation.  The  present  Chancellor 
of  Ireland,*  himself  a  finished  gentleman,  was  struck  upon  his 
arrival  *  by  the  peculiarly  gentlemanlike  manner  in  which  he 
observed  business  transacted  in  his  court.'  Mr.  Bushe  is  the 
great  model  of  this  quality.  He  hands  up  a  point  of  law  to 
the  bench  with  as  much  grace  and  pliancy  of  gesture,  as  if  he 
were  presenting  a  court-lady  with  a  fan.  This  excessive 
finish  is  peculiar  to  himself;  but  the  spirit  which  dictates  it  is 
common  to  the  entire  profession.  Scenes  of  turbulent  alterca- 
tion are  inevitably  frequent,  and  every  weapon  of  disputation 
—  wit  and  sneers,  and  deadly  brain-blows  —  must  be  employed 
and  encountered  ;  but  the  contest  is  purely  intellectual :  it  is 
extremely  rare,  indeed,  that  anything  approaching  to  an 
offensive  personality  escapes.  No  ultra-forensic  warmth  occurs 
in  the  Irish  courts.  It  is  avoided  on  common  principles  of 
good  taste  :  it  is  also  prevented,  if  I  am  rightly  informed,  by 
the  understood  feeling  that  anything  bordering  upon  personal 
rudeness  must  infallibly  lead  to  a  settlement  out  of  Court. "t 

When  I  first  frequented  the  courts  in  Dublin,  I  went  entirely 
with  the  view  of  witnessing  the  specimens  of  forensic  talent 
displayed  there.  I  found  more  than  I  had  expected  ;  and  one 
circumstance  that  very  forcibly  struck  me  demands  a  few 
words  apart.     I  would  recommend  to  any  stranger  wishing  to 

*  The  late  Lord  Manners. — M. 

t  Sir  Jonah  Barrington,  in  the  amusing  "  Personal  Sketches  of  his  own 
Time,"  dedicates  a  chapter  to  the  Fire-eaters  of  Dublin,  and  gives  a  list  of 
leading  personages  (including  about  a  dozen  judges)  who  had  fought  duels  in 
his  time.  He  says :  "  The  number  of  killed  and  wounded  among  the  bar  was 
very  considerable.     The  other  learned  professions  suffered  much  less." — M. 


70  HALL    OF   THE    FOUR    COURTS,    DUBLIN". 

obtain  a  thorough  insight  into  the  state  of  manners  and  morals 
in  the  interior  of  Ireland,  without  incurring  the  risk  of  a  visit 
to  the  remoter  districts,  to  attend,  upon  a  few  motion-days,  in 
any  of  the  Irish  courts  of  common-law.  A  large  portion  of 
these  motions  relate  to  ineffectual  attempts  to  execute  the 
process  of  the  law ;  and  the  facts  that  daily  come  out,  offer  a 
frightful  and  most  disgraceful  picture  of  the  lawless  habits  of 
the  lower,  and  also,  I  regret  to  add,  of  the  higher  orders  of  the 
community.  One  of  our  judges  in  Westminster  Hall  would 
start  from  his  seat  in  wonder  and  indignation  at  the  details  of 
scenes  to  which  the  Irish  judges,  from  long  familiarity,  listen 
almost  unmoved,  as  to  mere  ordinary  outrages  of  course.  The 
office  of  a  process-server  in  Ireland  appears  to  be,  indeed,  a 
most  perilous  occupation,  and  one  that  requires  no  common 
qualities  in  the  person  that  undertakes  it :  he  must  unite  the 
courage  and  strength  of  the  common  soldier  with  the  conduct 
and  skill  in  stratagem  of  the  experienced  commander;  for  wo 
betide  him,  if  he  be  deficient  in  either.  The  moment  this 
hostile  herald  of  the  law  is  known  to  be  hovering  on  the  con- 
fines of  a  Oonnaught  gentleman's  domain  (that  sacred  territory 
into  which  his  Majesty's  writs  have  no  right  to  run),  the  proud 
blood  of  the  defendant  swells  up  to  the  boiling  point,  and  he 
takes  the  promptest  measures  to  repel  and  chastise  the  intru- 
der:  he  summons  his  servants  and  tenants  to  a  council  of  Avar; 
he  stiffens  their  fidelity  by  liberal  doses  of  "mountain-dew;"* 
they  swear  they  will  stand  by  "his  honor"  to  the  last.  Prep- 
arations as  against  a  regular  siege  ensue ;  doors  and  windows 
are  barred  ;  sentinels  stationed  ;  blunderbusses  charged  ;  ap- 
proved scouts  are  sent  out  to  reconnoitre ;  and  skirmishing 
parties,  armed  with  cudgels  and  pitchforks,  are  detached  along 
every  avenue  of  approach.  Having  taken  these  precautions, 
the  magnanimous  defendant  shuts  himself  up  in  his  inmost 
citadel  to  abide  the  issue.  The  issue  may  be  anticipated  ;  the 
messenger  of  the  law  is  either  deterred  from  coming  near,  or,  if 
he  has  the  hardihood  to  face  the  danger,  he  is  waylaid  and 

*  Illicit  whiskey — so  called,  from  being  generally  distilled  on  the  mountain- 
ous tracts.  [Sometimes  called  potheen,  as  made  in  a  little  pot,  or  Innoskowen, 
from  the  locality  where  the  best  was  produced. — 'M.] 


ORATORY    OF    THE    AFFIDAVIT.  71 

beaten  black  and  blue  for  his  presumption  :  if  lie  shows  the 
King's  writ,  it  is  torn  from  him,  and  flung  back  in  fragments 
in  his  face.  Resistance,  remonstrance,  and  entreaties,  are  all 
unavailing;  nothing  remains  for  him  but  to  effect  his  retreat, 
if  the  power  of  moving  be  left  him,  to  the  nearest  magistrate, 
not  in  the  interest  of  the  defendant,  where  with  the  help  of 
some  attorney  that  will  venture  to  take  a  fee  against  "  his 
honor,"  he  draws  up  a  bulletin  of  his  kicks  and  bruises  in  the 
form  of  an  affidavit,  to  ground  a  motion  that  "  another  writ  do 
issue;"  or,  as  it  might  be  more  correctly  worded,  "that 
another  process-server  do  expose  himself  to  as  sound  a  thrash- 
ing as  the  last."  This  is  not  an  exaggerated  picture;  and  in 
order  to  complete  it,  it  should  not  be  omitted  that  the  instiga- 
tor of  the  outrage,  as  soon  as  he  can  with  safety  appear  abroad, 
will,  to  a  certainty,  be  found  among  the  most  clamorous  for 
proclamations  and  insurrection-acts,  to  keep  down  the  lawless 
propensities  of  his  district.* 

I  have  offered  a  specimen  of  Irish  society,  as  I  could  collect 
it  from  affidavits  daily  produced  in  court ;  yet,  shocking  and 
disgusting  as  the  details  are,  I  confess  it  is  not  easy  to  repress 
a  smile  at  the  style  in  which  those  adventurous  scenes  are 
described.  The  affidavits  are  generally  the  composition  of 
country  attorneys.  The  maltreated  process-server  puts  the 
story  of  his  injured  feelings  and  beaten  carcase  into  the  hands 

*  Considerable  ingenuity  used  to  be  exercised  in  tbe  treatment  of  process 
servers  in  Ireland.  It  was  said,  as  a  sort  of  boast,  that  "  the  King's  writ  would 
not  run  in  Connaught."  This  meant  that  nobody  could  serve  it.  To  say  of 
any  stranger,  in  that  district,  that  he  looked  like  a  process-server,  was  to  con- 
demn him,  at  the  least,  to  an  utter  impossibility  of  obtaining  food,  fire,  and 
lodging,  whether  for  love  or  money.  If  a  man  were  found  with  a  copy  of  a 
writ  in  bis  pocket,  waiting  the  opportunity  to  serve  it  on  a  popular  defendant, 
he  was  simply  condemned,  in  the  first  instance,  to  make  a  meal,  scrap  by  scrap, 
until  tftey  were  consumed,  of  the  parchment  original  and  the  paper  copy.  If 
detected  a  second  time,  the  common  penalty  was  to  have  his  ears  cut  off.  A 
third  attempt  was  rarely  made,  the  punishment  being  to  take  off  the  cul- 
prit's shirt,  hold  him  on  the  ground,  and  draw  a  thorny  furze-bush  over  his 
back,  to  and  fro,  until  it  was  shockingly  lacerated.  This  agreeable  and  humane 
practice,  which  was  called  carding,  chiefly  prevailed  in  Tipjierary.  At  present, 
among  other  changes  in  Ireland,  is  the  tolerance  of  legal  satellites.  Writs  now 
"  run"  in  Connaught  and  Tipperaxy,  quite  as  freely  as  in  Devonshire  or  Dur- 
ham.—  M. 


72  HALL   6F   fH1£   FOUfc   COTJRTS,    DUBLIN. 

of  one  of  these  learned  penmen  ;  and  I  must  do  tliem  the 
justice  to  say,  that  they  conscientiously  make  the  most  of  the 
task  confided  to  them.  They  have  all  a  dash  of  national 
eloquence  about  them;  the  leading  qualities  of  which,  meta- 
phor, pathos,  sonorous  phrase,  impassioned  delineation,  &c, 
they  liberally  embody  with  the  technical  details  of  facts,  form- 
ing a  class  of  oratory  quite  unknown  to  the  schools — "  The 
Oratory  of  the  Affidavit."  What  British  adviser,  for  instance, 
of  matters  to  be  given  in  on  oath,  would  venture  upon  such  a 
poetical  statement  as  the  following,  which  I  took  down  one 
day  in  the  Irish  Court  of  Common  Pleas:  "And  this  depo- 
nent farther  saith,  that  on  arriving  at  the  house  of  the  said 
defendant,  situate  in  the  county  of  Gal  way  aforesaid,  for  the 
purpose  of  personally  serving  him  with  the  said  writ,  he  the 
said  deponent  knocked  three  several  times  at  the  outer,  com- 
monly called  the  hall-door,  but  could  not  obtain  admittance ; 
whereupon  this  deponent  was  proceeding  to  knock  a  fourth 
time,  Avhen  a  man,  to  this  deponent  unknown,  holding  in  his 
hands  a  musket  or  blunderbuss,  loaded  with  balls  or  slugs,  as 
this  deponent  has  since  heard  and  verily  believes,  appeared  at 
one  of  the  upper  windows  of  said  house,  and,  presenting  said 
musket  or  blunderbuss  at  this  deponent,  threatened,  that  ■  if 
said  deponent  did  not  instantly  retire,  he  would  send  his, 
this  deponent's,  soul  to  hell ;'  which  this  deponent  verily  believes 
he  would  have  done — had  not  this  deponent  precipitately  es- 
caped." 


DANIEL   O'CONNELL. 

If  any  one,  being  a  stranger  in  Dublin,  should  chance,  as 
you  return  upon  a  winter's  morning  from  one  of  the  "  small 
and  early"  parties  of  that  raking  metropolis  —  that  is  to  say, 
between  the  hours  of  five  and  six  o'clock  —  to  pass  along  the 
south  side  of  Merrion  Square,*  you  will  not  fail  to  observe  that 
among  those  splendid  mansions  there  is  one  evidently  tenanted 
by  a  person  whose  habits  differ  materially  from  those  of  his 
fashionable  neighbors.  The  half-opened  parlor-shutter,  and 
the  light  within,  announce  that  some  one  dwells  there  whose 
time  is  too  precious  to  permit  him  to  regulate  his  rising  with 
the  sun's.  Should  your  curiosity  tempt  you  to  ascend  the 
steps,  and,  under  cover  of  the  dark,  to  reconnoitre  the  interior, 
you  will  see  a  tall,  able-bodied  man  standing  at  a  desk,  and 
immersed  in  solitary  occupation.  Upon  the  wall  in  front  of 
him  there  hangs  a  crucifix.  From  this,  and  from  the  calm  at- 
titude of  the  person  within,  and  from  a  certain  monastic  rotun- 
dity about  his  neck  and  shoulders,  your  first  impression  will 
be,  that  he  must  be  some  pious  dignitary  of  the  Church  of 
Rome  absorbed  in  his  matin  devotions. 

But  this  conjecture  will  be  rejected  almost  as  soon  as  formed. 
No  sooner  can  the  eye  take  in  the  other  furniture  of  the  apart- 
ment—  the  book-cases  clogged  with  tomes  in  plain  calf-skin 
binding,  the  blue-covered  octavos  that  lie  about  on  the  tables 
and  the  floor,  the  reams  of  manuscript  in  oblong  folds  and  be- 
girt with  crimson  tape  —  than  it  becomes  evident  that  the 
party  meditating  amid  such  objects  must  be  thinking  far  more 

*  One  of  the  principal  squares  in  Dublin,  in  which  Mr.  O'Connell  resided 
for  about  thirty  years. — M. 

Vol.  I.— 4  ^ 


74  DANIEL   o'cONNETX. 

of  the  law  than  the  prophets.  He  is,  unequivocally,  a  barris 
ter,  but  apparently  of  that  homely,  chamber-keeping,  plodding 
cast,  who  labor  hard  to  make  up  by  assiduity  what  they  want 
in  wit  —  who  are  up  and  stirring  before  the  bird  of  the  morning 
has  sounded  the  retreat  to  the  wandering  spectre  —  and  are 
already  brain-deep  in  the  dizzying  vortex  of  mortgages  and 
cross-remainders,  and  mergers  and  remitters  ;  while  his  clients, 
still  lapped  in  sweet  oblivion  of  the  law's  delay,  are  fondly 
dreaming  that  their  cause  is  peremptorily  set  down  for  a  final 
hearing.  Having  come  to  this  conclusion,  you  push  on  for 
home,  blessing  your  stars  on  the  way  that  you  are  not  a  law- 
yer, and  sincerely  compassionating  the  sedentary  drudge  whom 
you  have  just  detected  in  the  performance  of  his  cheerless  toil. 
But  should  you  happen,  in  the  course  of  the  same  day,  to 
stroll  down  to  the  Four  Courts,  you  will  be  not  a  little  sur- 
prised to  find  the  object  of  your  pity  miraculously  transferred 
from  the  severe  recluse  of  the  morning  into  one  of  the  most 
bustling,  important,  and  joyous  personages,  in  that  busy  scene. 
There  you  will  be  sure  to  see  him,  his  countenance  braced  up 
and  glistening  with  health  and  spirits* — with  a  huge,  plethoric 
bag,  which  his  robust,  arms  can  scarcely  sustain,  clasped  with 
paternal  fondness  to  his  breast  —  and  environed  by  a  living 
palisade  of  clients  and  attorneys,  with  outstretched  necks,  and 
mouths  and  ears  agape,  to  catch  up  any  chance- opinion  that 
may  be  coaxed  out  of  him  in  a  colloquial  way,  or  listening  to 
what  the  client  relishes  still  better  (for  in  no  event  can  they 
be  slided  into  a  bill  of  costs),  the  counsellor's  bursts  of  jovial 
and  familiar  humor,  or,  when  he  touches  on  a  sadder  strain, 
his  prophetic  assurances  that  the  hour  of  Ireland's  redemption 
is  at  hand.  You  perceive  at  once  that  you  have  lighted  upon 
a  great  popular  advocate  ;  and  if  you  take  the  trouble  to  follow 
his  movements  for  a  couple  of  hours  through  the  several  Courts, 
you  will  not  fail  to  discover  the  qualities  that  have  made  him 
so — his  legal  competency  —  his  business-like  habits  —  his  san- 

*  O'Connell  was  a  man  of  lofty  stature,  strong  build,  genei-al  good  health, 
and  accustomed  to  a  great  deal  of  exercise.  His  three  months'  imprisonment  in 
Richmond  Penitentiary,  after  the  State  Trials  of  1844,  may  be  said  to  have 
broken  up  his  strong  constitution.  The  prisoned  eagle  pined  for  want  of  its 
Wonted  free  range  over  mountain,  plain,  and  valley. —  M. 


VERSATILITY    AND    UBIQUITY.  ?5 

guine  temperament,  which  renders  him  not  merely  the  advo- 
cate hut  the  partisan  of  his  client  —  his  acuteness  —  his  fluency 
of  thought  and  language  —  his  unconquerahle  good-humor  — 
and,  above  all,  his  versatility. 

By  the  hour  of  three,  when  the. judges  usually  rise,  you  will 
have  seen  him  go  through  a  quantity  of  business,  the  prepara- 
tion for  and  performance  of  which,  would  be  sufficient  to  wear 
down  an  ordinary  constitution,  and  you  naturally  suppose  that 
the  remaining  portion  of  the  day  must  of  necessity  be  devoted 
to  recreation  or  repose  :  but  here,  again,  you  will  be  mistaken  ; 
for  should  you  feel  disposed,  as  you  return  from  the  Courts,  to 
drop  in  to  any  of  the  public  meetings  that  are  almost  daily 
held  for  some  purpose,  or  to  no  purpose,  in  Dublin,  to  a  cer- 
tainty you  will  find  the  counsellor  there  before  you,  the  presi- 
ding spirit  of  the  scene,  riding  in  the  whirlwind,  and  directing 
the  storm  of  popular  debate,  with  a  strength  of  lungs,  and  re- 
dundancy of  animation,  as  if  he  had  that  moment  started  fresh 
for  the  labors  of  the  day.  There  he  remains  until,  by  dint  of 
strength  or  dexterity,  he  has  carried  every  point;  and  thence, 
if  you  would  see  him  to  the  close  of  the  day's  "eventful  his- 
tory," you  will,  in  all  likelihood,  have  to  follow  him  to  a  pub- 
lic dinner,  from  which,  after  having  acted  a  conspicuous  part 
in  the  turbulent  festivity  of  the  evening,  and  thrown  off  half  a 
dozen  speeches  in  praise  of  Ireland,  he  retires  at  a  late  hour 
to  repair  the  wear  and  tear  of  the  day  by  a  short  interval  of 
repose,  and  is  sure  to  be  found  before  dawn-break  next  morn- 
ing at  his  solitary  post,  recommencing  the  routine  of  his  rest- 
less existence.  Now,  any  one  who  has  once  seen,  in  the  pre- 
ceding situations,  the  able-bodied,  able-minded,  acting,  talking, 
multifarious  person  I  have  been  just  describing,  has  no  occa- 
sion to  inquire  his  name:  he  may  be  assured  that  he  is,  and 
can  be,  no  other  than  "  Kerry's  pride  and  Minister's  glory," 
the  far-famed  and  indefatigable  Daniel  O'Connell. 

Mr.  O'Oonnell  was  born  about  eight-and-forty  years  ago,  in 
that  part  of  the  united  kingdoms  of  Ireland  and  Kerry,  called 
Kerry.*     He  is  said  to  be  descended  in  a  mathematically  and 

*  This  sketch  appeared  in  1823.  Daniel  O'Connell,  born  August  6,  1775, 
•lied  on  the  loth  of  May,  1 847,"  in  his  seventy-second  year.     He  was  of  a  long 


76  DANIEL    O^CONNKLL. 

morally  straight  line  from  the  ancient  kings  of  Ivera,  one  of 
the  kingdoms  of  the  county  of  Kerry.  The  discrowned  fam- 
ily, however,  have  something  better  than  the  saddening  boast 

lived  family,  for  his  uncle  Maurice,  from  whom  he  inherited  Derrynane  abbey, 
was  97,  at  his  death,  in  1825 ;  and  another  uncle;  General  O'Connell,  in  the 
French  service,  and  grand-cross  of  the  order  of  St.  Louis,  died  in  1834,  ag^d 
91.  He  was  then  not  only  a  general  in  the  French,  but  oldest  colonel  in  the 
English  service,  and  the  present  military  tactics  of  Europe  emanated,  in  1787, 
from  a  military  board  in  which  he  was  the  lowest  in  rank,  but  highest  in  abil- 
ity. In  Easter  Term,  1798  (a  few  months  before  the  "  Rebellion"),  O'Connell 
was  called  to  the  Irish  bar,  and  his  ability  and  industry  soon  obtained  him 
business.  In  1802,  he  married  his  cousin.  He  opposed  the  Union,  and  in 
1809,  commenced  his  public  agitation  for  Catholic  emancipation.  He  became 
a  leader  of  the  Catholic  Board,  and  when  that  body  was  put  down  by  the  Irish 
government,  while  others  silently  submitted,  O'Connell  assumed  the  leadership 
and  published  the  first  of  his  annual  letters  to  the  people  of  Ireland,  headed 
with  the  motto,  from  Childe  Harold, 

"  Hereditary  bondsmen,  know  ye  not, 
Who  would  be  free,  themselves  must  strike  the  blow." 
At  aggregate  and  other  public  meetings  of  the  Catholics,  he  was  the  chief  speak- 
er and  doer,  for  years.  In  1815,  he  was  forced  into  a  duel  with  Mr.  D'Esterre, 
one  of  the  city  of  Dublin  corporation,  and  the  assailant  fell.  A  subsequent  mis- 
understanding with  Mr.  (the  late  Sir  Robert)  Peel,  then  Secretary  for  Ireland, 
led  to  a  challenge,  but  the  duel  was  prevented  by  the  arrest  of  O'Connell,  on 
his  way  to  Calais,  whither  Peel  had  gone,  as  beyond  the  jurisdiction  of  British 
law.  At  that  time,  O'Connell  determined  never  again  to  become  a  combatant. 
Fiom  1815,  until  1831,  when  he  leff  the  bar,  his  professional  income  averaged 
from  six  thousand  to  eight  thousand  pounds  sterling  a  year,'  and  on  his  uncle's 
death  in  1825,  he  succeeded  to  landed  property  estimated  at  four  thousand 
pounds  sterling  per  annum.  He  was,  beyond  all  doubt,  the  best  general  law- 
yer in  Ireland.  In  1821,  on  the  visit  of  George  IV.  to  Ireland,  he  played  the 
courtier  —  more  genially  than  gracefully.  In  1823,  he  founded  the  Catholic 
Association,  in  conjunction  with  Mr.  Sheil  —  organized  the  catholic  rent,  by 
which  the  battle  of  the  people  was  fought  at  the  election  hustings  —  formed 
one  of  a  deputation  to  England,  to  adjust  the  catholic  claims  —  committed  the 
error  of  consenting  to  accept  emancipation,  clogged  with  "  the  wings"  (i.  e. 
state  payment  of  the  catholic  clei'gy,  and  confiscation  of  the  forty  shillings  sterl 
ing  elective  franchise)  was  baffled  by  the  intolerants — ventured  in  1828,  on  the 
boM  expedient  of  contesting  the  Clare  election,  against  a  popular  member 
of  the  Wellington  cabinet  —  was  elected,  and  thereby  forced  Wellington  to 
concede  Emancipation,  in  1829  —  had  a  seat  in  parliament  until  his  death  — 
was  of  great  weight  as  a  public  man,  by  reason  of  his  eloquence,  tact,  and  in- 
fluence, carrying  forty  Irish  members  with  him  in  a  division  —  aided  the  Mel- 
bourne ministry  against  Peel  —  was  offered  and  declined  a  seat  on  the  judicial 
bench,  as  Master  of  the  Rolls  in  Ireland  —  carried  on  the  "  Repeal"  agitation, 


HIS    ORIGINAL    DESTINATION.  77 

of  regal  descent  to  prop  their  pride.  His  present  ex-Majesty 
of  Ivera,  Mr.  Daniel  O'Connell's  uncle,  lias  a  territorial  reve- 
nue of  four  or  five  thousand  a  year  to  support  the  dignity  of 
his  traditional  throne;  while  the  numerous  princes  of  the 
blood,  dispersed  through  the  dominions  of  their  fathers,  in  the 
characters  of  tenants  in  fee-simple,  opulent  leaseholders,  or 
sturdy  mortgagees  in  possession,  form  a  compact  and  powerful 
squirearchy,  before  whose  influence  the  proud  "  descendants 
of  the  stranger"  are  often  made  to  bow  their  necks,  in  the 
angry  collisions  of  county  politics.  The  subject  of  the  present 
notice  is  understood  to  be  the  heir-apparent  to  his  uncle's  pos- 
sessions. These  he  must  soon  enjoy,  for  his  royal  kinsman  has 
passed  his  ninetieth  year.*  In  the  meantime  he  rules  in  his 
own  person  an  extensive  tract  among  the  Kerry  hills  —  of  little 
value,  it  is  said,  in  point  of  revenue,  but  dear  to  the  possessor 
as  the  residence  of  the  idol  of  his  heart,  and  in  truth  almost 
the  only  tenant  on  three  fourths  of  the  estate  — 

"  The  mountain-nymph,  sweet  Liberty." 

Mr.  O'Connell  was  originally  intended  for  the  Church,  or, 
more  strictly  speaking,  for  the  Chapel.  He  was  sent,  accord- 
ing to  the  necessities  of  the  time,  to  be  educated  at  St.  Omer ; 
for  in  those  days  the  Avise  government  of  Ireland  would  not 
allow  the  land  of  Protestant  ascendency  to  be  contaminated 
by  a  public  school  of  Catholic  theology.  Dr.  Duigenan  was 
compelled  to  permit  the  detested  doctrines  to  be  freely  preached ; 
but  to  make  the  professors  of  them  good  subjects,  he  shrewdly 
insisted  that  they  should  still,  as  of  old,  be  forced  to  cross  the 
seas,  and  lay  in  a  preliminary  stock  of  Irish  loyalty  at  a  for- 
eign university.     But  the  dread  of  indigenous  theology  was 

during  all  this  time  —  was  prosecuted  for  presumed  overt-acts,  in  1843,  and  con- 
demned, with  others,  after  a  trial  which  lasted  twenty-five  days  —  was  convict 
ed — had  the  judgment  reversed,  by  the  House  of  Lords,  after  he  and  his  friends 
had  been  three  months  in  prison,  and,  soon  after,  saw  his  own  moderate  policy 
opposed  by  the  bolder  leaders  of  the  "  Young  Ireland"  party,  whereby  his  own 
popularity  declined  —  suffered  from  declining  health  —  went  to  Italy,  and  died 
at  Genoa,  before  he  could  reach  Rome,  "  the  City  of  the  Soul"  to  so  earnest  a 
Catholic  as  he  waB. —  M. 

*  Maurice  O'Connell  did  not  die  until  1825,  two  years  after  this  sketch  ap- 
peared.—  M. 


78  DANIEL    o'gONNKLL. 

not  peculiar  to  that  great  man*.  I  observe  that  some  English 
statesmen  have  discovered  that  all  the  disasters  of  Ireland 
have  been  caused  by  an  invisible  establishment  of  Jesuits,  and 
must  continue  until  the  omnipotence  of  Parliament  cIiaII  expel 
the  intruders  —  a  felicitous  insight  into  cause  and  effect,  resem- 
bling that  of  the  orthodox  crew  of  a  British  packet,  who,  having 
discovered,  during  a  gale  of  wind,  that  a  Methodist  preacher 
was  among  the  passengers,  at  once  made  up  their  minds  that 
the  fury  of  the  tempest  would  never  abate  until  the  vessel 
should  be  exorcised  by  heaving  the  nonconformist  overboard. 

I  have  not  heard  what  occasioned  Mr.  O'Connell  to  change 
his  destination.  He  probably  had  the  good  sense  to  feel  that 
he  had  too  much  flesh  and  blood  for  a  cloister;  and  the  nov- 
elty of  a  legal  career  to  a  Catholic  (for  the  Bar  had  just  been 
opeued  to  his  persuasion)  must  have  had  its  attractions.  He 
accordingly  left  St.  Omer,  with  its  casuistry,  and  fasting,  and 
vesper-hymns,  to  less  earthly  temperaments  ;  and  having  swal- 
lowed the  regular  number  of  legs  of  mutton  at  the  Middle 
Temple,  was  duly  admitted  to  the  Irish  Bar  in  Easter  term, 
1798.  The  event  has  justified  his  choice.  With  all  the  im- 
pediments of  his  religion  and  his  politics,  his  progress  was 
rapid.  He  is  now,  and  has  been  for  many  years,  as  high  in 
his  profession  as  it  is  possible  for  a  Catholic  to  ascend. 

Mr.  O'Connell,  if  not  the  ablest,  is  certainly  the  most  singu- 
lar man  at  the  Irish  Bar.  He  is  singular,  not  merely  in  the 
vigor  of  his  faculties,  but  in  their  extreme  variety  and  apparent 
inconsistency  ;  and  the  same  may  be  said  of  his  character. 
The  elements  of  both  are  so  many  and  diverse,  that  it  would 
seem  as  if  half  a  dozen  varieties  of  the  human  species,  and 

*  Patrick  Duigenan,  LL.D,  remarkable  even  amid  Irish  absolutism  and  ultra- 
Protestantism,  for  his  defence  of  arbitrary  power  and  his  rank  intolerance.  He 
was  the  bosom  friend  and  abettor  of  Lord  Clare,  the  chanceiic-r  of  Ireland, 
and  was  his  adviser  and  agent,  in  public  matters,  for  many  years.  Dr. 
Duigenan  was  born  in  1735,  of  humble  parents  and  died  in  1816.  Called  to 
the  bar,  he  became  King's  advocate  in,  and  subsequently  Judge  of,  the  Prerog- 
ative Court,  in  Dublin.  He  was  also  vicar-general  of  the  Arch-diocese  of 
Armagh,  Member  of  Parliament,  Doctor  of  Laws,  and  a  Privy  Councillor.  He 
was  a  pamphleteer  of  more  fecundity  tl  an  force,  and  one  of  the  most  violent 
anti-Catholic  partisans  of  his  day. —  M. 


HIS    APPEARANCE.  79 

these  not  always  on  the  best  terms  with  eacli  other,  had  heen 
capriciously  huddled  together  into  a  single  frame  to  make  up 
his  strange  and  complex  identity  ;  and  hence  it  is,  that,  though 
he  is  a  favorable  subject  for  a  sketch,  I  find  the  task  of  acci1- 
rate  delineation  to  be  far  less  easy  than  I  anticipated.  I 
have  the  man  before  me,  and  willing  enough,  it  would  appear, 
that  his  features  should  be  commemorated  ;  but,  like  the  poor 
artist  that  had  to  deal  with  the  frisky  philosopher  of  Ferney,* 
with  all  my  efforts  I  can  not  keep  him  steady  to  any  single 
posture  or  expression.  I  see  him  distinctly  at  one  moment  a 
hard-headed  working  lawyer,  the  next  a  glowing  politician, 
the  next  an  awful  theologian;  his  features  now  sunk  into  the 
deepest  shade  of  patriotic  anguish,  now  illuminated,  no  one 
can  tell  why,  as  for  the  celebration  of  a  national  triumph.  A 
little  while  back  I  caught  him  in  his  character  of  a  sturdy  re- 
former, proclaiming  the  constitution,  and  denouncing  the  vices 
of  courts  and  kings,  and  he  promised  me  that  he  would  keep 
to  that ;  but,  before  I  had  time  to  look  about  me,  there  he  was, 
off  to  the  levee  !  be-bagged  and  be-sworded  like  any  oppres- 
sor of  them  all,  playing  off  his  loyal  looks  and  anti-radical 
bows,  as  if  he  was  to  be  one  of  Mr.  Blake'sf  next  baronets,  or 
as  if  he  had  not  sufficiently  proved  his  attachment  to  the 
throne  by  presenting  his  majesty  with  a  crown  of  Irish  laurel 

*  Francis  Marie  Arouet  de  Voltaire,  born  in  1694,  died  1778.  He  was  im- 
prisoned in  the  Bastille,  in  1716,  on  suspicion  of  having  libelled  the  Govern- 
ment. Here  he  planned  his  poem  of  the  "  Henriade,"  and  wrote  the  tragedy 
of  (Edipus,  acted  in  1718,  with  marked  success.  Henceforth  his  career  was 
wholly  literary,  but  his  political  and  philosophical  opinions  constantly  set  him  at 
issue  with  "  the  powers  that  be,"  and  much  of  his  time  was  passed  in  exile.  In 
1743,  his  play  of  "  Merope"  was  so  well  received  at  Paris,  that  he  was  ap 
pointed  gentleman  of  the  King's  bed-chamber,  and  historiographer  of  France 
In  1750,  he  went  to  Berlin,  on  a  visit  to  Frederic  of  Prussia,  with  whom  he 
speedily  quarrelled.  Finally  he  retired  to  the  villago  of  Ferney,  in  Switzerland, 
where  he  lived  during  the  rest  of  his  life,  with  Madame  Denis,  his  niece.  His 
works,  in  seventy  octavo  volumes,  include  nearly  all  departments  of  polite  lit- 
erature— chiefly  poetry,  history,  biography,  fiction,  philosophy,  criticism,  and 
the  drama.  A  few  days  before  his  death,  he  was  publicly  crowned  with  laurel 
on  the  stage  of  the  theatre  in  Paris. —  M. 

t  Mr.  Blake,  who  filled  the  lucrative  office  of  Chief  Remembrancer  of  the 
Court  of  Exchequei*,  was  a  Catholic  who  contrived  to  be  "hand  and  glove" 
with  all  parties,  with  his  sincerity  questioned  by  none. —  M. 


80  DANIEL    o'coNNELL. 

on  the  beacli  of  Dunleary.*  Such  a  compound  can  be  describ- 
ed only  by  enumerating  its  several  ingredients;  and  even 
here  I  am  not  sure  that  my  performance,  if  rigidly  criticised, 
may  not  turn  out,  like  my  subject,  to  be  occasionally  at  vari- 
ance with  itself.  I  shall  begin  with  (what  in  other  eminent 
lawyers  is  subordinate)  his  individual  and  extra-professional 
peculiarities ;  for  in  O'Oonnell  these  are  paramount,  and  act  a 
leading  part  in  every  scene,  whether  legal  or  otherwise,  of  his 
complicated  avocations. 

His  frame  is  tall,  expanded,  and  muscular;  precisely  such 
as  befits  a  man  of  the  people — for  the  physical  classes  ever 
look  with  double  confidence  and  affection  upon  a  leader  who 
represents  in  his  own  person  the  qualities  upon  which  they 
rely.  In  his  face  he  has  been  equally  fortunate ;  it  is  ex- 
tremely comely.  The  features  are  at  once  soft  and  manly ; 
the  florid  glow  of  health  and  a  sanguine  temperament  is  dif- 
fused over  the  whole  countenance,  which  is  national  in  the 
outline,  and  beaming  with  national  emotion.  The  expression 
is  open  and  confiding,  and  inviting  confidence;  there  is  not  a 
trace  of  malignity  or  wile  —  if  there  were,  the  bright  and 
sweet  blue  eyes,  the  most  kindly  and  honest-looking  that  can 
be  conceived,  would  repel  the  imputation.  These  popular  gifts 
of  nature  O'Oonnell  has  not  neglected  to  set  off  by  his  exter- 
nal carriage  and  deportment  —  or,  perhaps,  I  should  rather 
say,  that  the  same  hand  which  has  moulded  the  exterior  has 
supersaturated  the  inner  man  with  a  fund  of  restless  propen- 
sity, which  it  is  quite  beyond  his  power,  as  it  is  certainly  be- 
side his  inclination,  to  control.  A  large  portion  of  this  is  ne- 
cessarily expended  upon  his  legal  avocations ;  but  the  labors 
of  the  most  laborious  of  professions  can  not  tame  him  into  re- 
pose :  after  deducting  the  daily  drains  of  the  study  and  the 
courts,  there  remains  an  ample  residuum  of  animal  spirits  and 
ardor  for  occupation,  which  go  to  form  a  distinct,  and,  I  might 
say,  a  predominant  character — the  political  chieftain.  The 
existence  of  this  overweening  vivacity  is  conspicuous  in  O'Oon- 
nell's  manners  and  movements,  and  being  a  popular,  and  more 

*  After  the  visit  of  George  IV.  in  1821,  Dunleary  (the  port  of  Publin)  jo- 
l*jned  and  keeps  the  name  of  Kingston. —  M. 


HIS    LEGAL    QUALIFICATIONS.  81 

particularly  a  national  quality,  greatly  recommends  him  to  the 
Irish  people  — "  Mohilitate  vigct"  —  body  and  soul  are  in  a 
state  of  permanent  insurrection. 

See  him  in  the  streets,  and  you  perceive  at  once  that  he  is  a 
man  who  has  sworn  that  his  country's  wrongs  shall  be  avenged. 
A  Dublin  jury  (if  judiciously  selected)  would  fin3  his  very  gait 
and  gestures  to  be  high  treason  by  construction  so  explicitly 
do  they  enforce  th°  national  sentiment,  of  "Ireland  her  own, 
or  the  world  in  a  blaze."  As  he  marches  to  court,  he  shoulders 
his  umbrella  as  if  it  were  a  pike.  He  flings  out  one  factious 
foot  before  the  other,  as  if  he  had  already  burst  his  bonds,  and 
was  kicking  the  Protestant  ascendency  before  him  ;  while 
ever  and  anon  a  democratic,  broad-shouldered  roll  of  the  upper 
man,  is  manifestly  an  indignant  effort  to  shuffle  off  "  the  op- 
pression of  seven  hundred  years."  This  intensely  national 
sensibility  is  the  prevailing  peculiarity  in  O'OonnelPs  char- 
acter; for  it  is  not  only  when  abroad,  and  in  the  popular  gaze, 
that  Irish  affairs  seem  to  press  on  his  heart:  the  same  Erin- 
go-bragh  feeling  follows  him  into  the  most  technical  details  of 
his  forensic  occupations.  Give  him  the  most  dry  and  abstract 
position  of  law  to  support  —  the  most  remote  that  imagination 
can  conceive  from  the  violation  of  the  Articles  of  Limerick,  or 
the  rape  of  the  Irish  parliament,  and,  ten  to  one,  but  he  will 
contrive  to  interweave  a  patriotic  episode  upon  those  examples 
of  British  domination.  The  people  are  never  absent  from  his 
thoughts.  He  tosses  np  a  bill  of  exceptions  to  a  judge's  charge 
in  the  name  of  Ireland,  and  pockets  a  special  retainer  with  the 
air  of  a  man  that  dotes  upon  his  country.  Tliere  is,  perhaps, 
some  share  of  exaggeration  in  all  this ;  but  much  less,  I  do 
believe,  than  is  generally  suspected,  and  I  apprehend  that  he 
would  scarcely  pass  for  a  patriot  without  it;  for,  in  fact,  he  has 
been  so  successful,  and  looks  so  contented,  and  his  elastic, 
unbroken  spirits,  are  so  disposed  to  bound  and  frisk  for  very 
joy —  in  a  word,  he  has  naturally  so  bad  a  face  for  a  grievance, 
that  his  political  sincerity  might  appear  equivocal,  were  there 
not  some  clouds  of  patriotic  grief  or  indignation  to  temper  the 
sunshine  that  is  for  ever  bursting  through  them. 

Ah   a  professional  man   O'Oonnell  is,  perhaps,  for  general 

4# 


82  daniel  o'gonnell: 

business,  the  most  competent  advocate  at  the  Irish  bar.  Every 
requisite  for  a  barrister  of  all-work  is  combined  in  him;  some 
in  perfection  —  all  in  sufficiency.  He  is  not  understood  to  be 
a  deep  scientific  lawyer.  He  is,  Avhat  is  far  better  for  himself 
and  his  clients,  an  admirably  practical  one.  He  is  a  thorough 
adept  in  all  the  complicated  and  fantastic  forms  with  which 
Justice,  like  a  Chinese  monarch,  insists  that  her  votaries  shall 
approach  her.  A  suitor  advancing  toward  her  throne,  can  not 
go  through  the  evolutions  of  the  indispensable  Ko-lou  under  a 
more  skilful  master  of  the  ceremonies.  In  this  department 
of  his  profession,  the  knowledge  of  the  practice  of  the  courts, 
and  in  a  perfect  familiarity  with  the  general  principles  of  law 
that  are  applicable  to  questions  discussed  in  open  court,  O'Oon- 
nell  is  on  a  level  with  the  most  experienced  of  his  competitors; 
and  with  few  exceptions,  perhaps  with  the  single  one  of  Mr. 
Plunket,  he  surpasses  them  all  in  the  vehement  and  perti- 
nacious talent  with  which  he  contends  to  the  last  for  victory, 
or,  where  victory  is  impossible,  for  an  honorable  retreat.  If 
his  mind  had  been  duly  disciplined,  he  would  have  been  a 
first-rate  reasoner  and  a  most  formidable  sophist.  He  has  all 
the  requisites  from  nature — singular  clearness,  promptitude, 
and  acuteness.  When  occasion  requires,  he  evinces  a  meta- 
physical subtlety  of  perception  which  nothing  can  elude. 
The  most  slippery  distinction  that  glides  across  him,  he  can 
grasp  and  hold  "  pressis  manubus,"  until  he  pleases  to  set  it 
free.  But  his  argumentative  powers  lose  much  of  their  effect 
from  want  of  arrangement.  His  thoughts  have  too  much  of 
the  impatience  of  conscious  strength  to  submit  to  an  orderly 
disposition.  Instead  of  moving  to  the  conflict  in  compact 
array,  they  rush  forward  like  a  tumultuary  insurgent  mass, 
jostling  and  overturning  one  another  in  the  confusion  of  the 
charge  ;  and,  though  finally  beating  down  all  opposition  by 
sheer  strength  and  numbers,  still  reminding  us  of  the  far 
greater  things  they  might  have  achieved  had  they  been  better 
drilled. 

But  O'Connell  has,  by  temperament,  a  disdain  of  everything 
that  is  methodical  and  sedate.  You  can  see  this  running 
through  lils  whole  deportment  in  court.     I  never  knew  a  learn- 


HIS    DEMEANOR    IN    COURT.  S3 

ed  personage  who  resorted  so  little  to  the  ordinary  tricks  of 
his  vocation.  As  he  sits  waiting-  till  his  turn  comes  to  "  blaze 
away,"  he  appears  totally  exempt  from  the  usual  throes  and 
heavings  of  animo-gestation.  There  is  no  hermetically-sealing 
of  the  lips,  as  if  nothing  less  could  restrain  the  fermentation 
within;  there  are  no  trances  of  abstraction,  as  if  the  though Ls 
had  left  their  home  on  a  distant  voyage  of  discovery  ;  no 
haughty  swellings  of  fthe  mind  into  alto-relievos  on  the  learned 
brow;  —  there  is  nothing  of  this  about  O'Oonnell.  On  the 
contrary,  his  countenance  and  manner  impress  you  with  the 
notion,  that  he  looks  forward  to  the  coming  effort  as  a  pastime 
in  which  he  takes  delight.  Instead  of  assuming  the  "  Sir 
Oracle,"  he  is  all  gayety  and  good-humor,  and  seldom  fails 
to  disturb  the  gravity  of  the  proceedings  by  a  series  of  disor- 
derly jokes,  for  which  he  is  duly  rebuked  by  his  antagonists 
with  a  solemnity  of  indignation  that  provokes  a  repetition 
of  the  offence  ;  but  his  insubordinate  levity  is,  for  the  most 
part,  so  redeemed  by  his  imperturbable  good-temper,  that  even 
the  judges,  when  compelled  to  interfere  and  pronounce  him 
out  of  order,  are  generally  shaking  their  sides  as  heartily  as  the 
most  enraptured  of  his  admirers  in  the  galleries.  In  the 
midst,  however,  of  this  seeming  carelessness,  his  mind  is,  in 
reality,  attending  with  the  keenest  vigilance  to  the  subject- 
matter  of  discussion ;  and  the  contrast  is  often  quite  amusing. 
While  his  eyes  are  wantoning  around  the  court  in  search  of 
an  object  to  be  knocked  down  by  a  blow  of  his  boisterous  play- 
fulness, or,  m  a  more  serious  mood,  while  he  is  sketching  on 
the  margin  of  his  brief  the  outline  of  an  impossible  republic, 
or  running  through  a  rough  calculation  of  the  number  of  Irish- 
men capable  of  bearing  pikes,  according  to  the  latest  returns 
of  the  population  —  if  the  minutest  irregularity  or  misstatement 
is  attempted  on  the  other  side,  up  he  is  sure  to  start  with  all 
imaginable  alertness,  and,  reassuming  the  advocate,  puts  for- 
ward his  objection,  with  a  degree  of  vigor  and  perspicuity 
which  manifests  that  his  attention  had  not  wandered  for  an 
instant  from  the  business  before  him. 

Mr.  O'Oonnell  is  in  particular  request  in  jury-cases.     There 
he  is  in   his  element.     Next  to  the  "harp  of  his  country,"  ftu 


84.  DANIEL    o'cONNELL. 

Irish  jury  is  the  instrument  on  which  he  delights  to  play  ;  and 
no  one  better  understands  its  qualities  and  compass.  I  have 
already  glanced  at  his  versatility.  It  is  here  that  it  is  dis- 
played. His  powers  as  a  Nisi-Prius  advocate,  consist  not  so 
much  in  the  perfection  of  any  of  the  qualities  necessary  to  the 
avt  of  persuasion,  as  in  the  number  of  them  that  he  has  at 
command,  and  the  skill  with  which  he  selects  and  adapts  them 
to  the  exigency  of  each  particular  case.  He  has  a  thorough 
knowledge  of  human  nature,  as  it  prevails  in  the  class  of  men 
whom  he  has  to  mould  to  his  purposes.  I  know  of  no  one  that 
exhibits  a  more  quick  and  accurate  perception  of  the  essential 
peculiarities  of  the  Irish  character.  It  is  not  merely  with  ref- 
erence to  their  passions  that  he  understands  them,  though  here 
he  is  pre-eminently  adroit.  He  can  cajole  a  dozen  of  miser- 
able corporation-hacks  into  the  persuasion  that  the  honor  of 
their  country  is  concentrated  in  their  persons.  His  mere  acting 
on  such  occasions  is  admirable  :  no  matter  how  base  and 
stupid,  and  how  poisoned  by  political  antipathy  to  himself,  he 
may  believe  them  to  be,  he  affects  the  most  complimentary 
ignorance  of  their  real  characters.  He  hides  his  scorn  and 
contempt  under  a  look  of  unbounded  reliance.  He  addresses 
them  with  all  the  deference  due  to  upright  and  high-minded 
jurors.  He  talks  to  them  of  "  the  eyes  of  all  Europe,"  and 
the  present  gratitude  of  Ireland,  and  the  residuary  blessings 
of  posterity,  with  the  most  perfidious  command  of  counte- 
nance. In  short,  by  dint  of  unmerited  commendations,  he 
belabors  them  into  the  belief  that,  after  all,  they  have  some 
reputation  to  sustain,  and  sets  them  chuckling  with  anticipated 
exultation,  at  the  honors  with  which  a  verdict  according  to  the 
evidence  is  to  consecrate  their  names. 

But,  in  addition  to  the  art  of  heating  the  passions  of  his 
hearers  to  the  malleable  point,  O'Connell  manifests  powers  of 
observation  of  another,  and,  for  general  purposes,  a  more  valu- 
able kind.  He  knows  that  strange  modification  of  humanity 
the  Irish  mind,  not  only  in  its  moral,  but  in  its  metaphysical 
peculiarities.  Throw  him  upon  any  particular  class  of  men 
and  you  would  imagine  that  he  must  have  lived  among  them 
all  \m  life,  so  intuitively  does  he  accommodate  his  stvle  0/ 


SIS   JURY   SPEECHES.  85 

argument  to  their  particular  modes  of  thinking  and  reasoning. 
He  knows  the  exact  quantity  of  strict  logic  which  they  will 
bear  or  can  comprehend.  Hence  (where  it  serves  his  purpose), 
instead  of  attempting  to  drag  them  along  with  him,  whether 
they  will  or  no,  by  a  chain  of  unbroken  demonstration,  he  has 
the  address  to  make  them  imagine  that  their  movements  are 
directed  solely  by  themselves.  He  pays  their  capacities  the 
compliment  of  not  making  things  too  clear.  Familiar  with  the 
habitual  tendencies  of  their  minds,  he  contents  himself  with 
throwing  off  rather  materials  for  reasoning  than  elaborate  rea- 
sonings—  mere  fragments,  or  seeds  of  thought,  which,  from  his 
knowledge  of  the  soil  in  which  they  drop,  he  confidently  pre- 
dicts will  shoot  up  and  expand  into  precisely  the  conclusions 
that  he  wants.  This  method  has  the  disadvantage,  as  far  as 
personally  regards  the  speaker,  of  giving  the  character  of  more 
than  his  usual  looseness  and  irregularity  to  O'Connell's  jury- 
speeches  ;  but  his  client,  for  whom  alone  he  labors,  is  a  gainer 
by  it  —  directly  in  the  way  I  have  been  stating,  and  indirectly 
for  this  reason,  that  it  keeps  the  jury  in  the  dark  as  to  the 
points  of  the  case  in  which  he  feels  he  is  weak.  By  abstain- 
ing from  a  show  of  rigorous  demonstration,  where  all  the  argu- 
ment is  evidently  upon  his  side,  he  excites  no  suspicion  by 
keeping  at  an  equal  distance  from  topics  which  he  could  not 
venture  to  approach.  This,  of  course,  is  not  to  be  taken  as 
O'Connell's  invariable  manner,  for  he  has  no  invariable  man- 
ner, but  as  a  specimen  of  that  dexterous  accommodation  of  par- 
ticular means  to  a  particular  end,  from  which  his  general 
powers  as  a  Nisi-Prius  advocate  may  be  inferred.  And  so,  too, 
of  the  tone  in  which  he  labors  to  extort  a  verdict ;  for  though 
when  compelled  by  circumstances,  he  can  be  soft  and  soothing, 
as  I  have  above  described  him,  yet  on  other  occasions,  where 
it  can  be  done  with  safety,  he  does  not  hesitate  to  apprise  a 
jury,  whose  purity  he  suspects,  of  his  real  opinion  of  their 
merits,  and  indeed,  not  unfrequently,  in  the  roundest  terms 
defies  them  to  balance  for  an  instant  between  their  malignant 
prejudices  and  the  clear  and  resistless  justice  of  the  case. 

There  is  one,  the  most  difficult,  it  is  said,  and  certainly  the 
most  anxious  and  responsible  part  of  an  advocate's  duties,  in 


$6  DANIEL    o'cONNFLL. 

winch  O'Connell  is  without  a  rival  at  the  Irish  Bar  —  I  allude 
to  his  skill  in  conducting  defences  in  the  Crown  court.  His 
ability  in  this  branch  of  his  profession  illustrates  one  of  those 
inconsistencies  in  his  character  to  which  I  have  already  ad- 
verted. Though  habitually  so  bold  and  sanguine,  he  is  here 
a  model  of  forethought  and  undeviating  caution.  In  his  most 
rapid  cross-examinations,  he  never  puts  a  dangerous  question. 
He  presses  a  witness  upon  collateral  facts,  and  beats  him 
down  by  arguments  and  jokes  and  vociferation  ;  but  wisely 
presuming  his  client  to  be  guilty  until  he  has  the  good  luck  to 
escape  conviction,  he  never  affords  the  witness  an  opportunity 
of  repeating  his  original  narrative,  and  perhaps  by  supplying 
an  omitted  item,  of  sealing  the  doom  of  the  accused. 

O'Connell's  ordinary  style  is  vigorous  and  copious,  but  in- 
correct. The  Avant  of  compactness  in  his  periods,  however,  I 
attribute  chiefly  to  inattention.  He  has  phrase  in  abundance 
at  command,  is  sensible  of  melody.  Every  now  and  then  he- 
throws  off  sentences  not  only  free  from  all  defect,  but  ex- 
tremely felicitous  specimens  of  diction.  As  to  his  general 
powers  of  eloquence,  he  rarely  fails  in  a  case  admitting  of  emo- 
tion, to  make  a  deep  impression  upon  a  jury;  and  in  a  popular 
assembly  he  is  supreme.  Still  there  is  much  more  of  elo- 
quence in  his  manner  and  topics  than  in  his  conceptions.  He 
unquestionably  proves,  by  occasional  bursts,  that  the  elements 
of  oratory,  and  perhaps  of  the  highest  order,  are  about  him  ; 
but  he  has  had  too  many  pressing  demands  of  another  kind  to 
distract  him  from  the  cultivation  of  this  the  rarest  of  all  attain- 
ments, and  accordingly  I  am  not  aware  that  any  of  his  efforts, 
however  able  and  successful,  have  deserved,  as  examples  of 
public  speaking,  to  survive  the  occasion.  His  manner,  though 
far  from  graceful,  is  earnest  and  impressive.  It  has  a  steady 
and  natural  warmth,  without  any  of  that  snappish  animation 
in  which  gentlemen  of  the  long  robe  are  prone  to  indulge. 
His  voice  is  powerful,  and  the  intonations  full  and  graduated. 
I  understand  that  when  he  first  appeared  at  the  Bar,  his  accent 
at  once  betrayed  his  foreign  education.  To  this  day  there  is  a 
remaining  dash  of  Foigardism  in  his  pronunciation  of  particular 
words;  but,  on   the  whole,  he  has  brought  himself,  as  far  as 


AS    A    POPULAR    LEADER.  8? 

deliver}7  is  concerned,  to  talk  pretty  much  like  a  British  sub- 
ject. 

It  Was  my  original  intention  to  have  dwelt  in  some  detail 
upon  O'Connell,  as  a  popular  leader,  but  I  have  no  longer 
space,  and  I  could  scarcely  effect  my  purpose  without  plunging 
into  that  "  sea  of  troubles,"  the  present  politics  of  Ireland  :  yet  a 
word  or  two  upon  the  subject  before  I  have  done.  Indeed,  in 
common  fairness,  I  feel  bound  to  correct  any  depreciating  in- 
ferences that  may  be  drawn  from  the  tone  of  levity  in  which 
I  may  have  glanced  at  some  traits  of  his  public  deportment, 
and  which  I  should  have  hesitated  to  indulge  in,  if  I  had  not 
given  him  credit  for  the  full  measure  of  good-humor  and  good 
sense,  that  can  discriminate  at  once  (should  these  pages  meet 
his  eye)  between  an  inoffensive  sally  and  a  hostile  sneer. 

O'Connell  has  been  now  [1823]  for  three  and  twenty  years 
a  busy  actor  upon  an  agitated  scene.  During  that  period  no 
public  character  has  been  more  zealously  extolled,  or  more 
cordially  reviled.  Has  the  praise  or  blame  been  excessive,  or 
has  either  been  undeserved  1  Has  he  been  a  patriot,  or  an 
incendiary  1  for,  such  are  the  extreme  points  of  view  in  which 
the  question  of  his  merits  has  been  discussed  by  persons  too 
impassioned  and  too  interested  in  the  result  to  pronounce  a 
sound  oph/.on  upon  it.  To  one,  however,  who  has  never  been 
provoked  to  admire  or  hate  him  to  excess,  the  solution  may 
not  be  difficult.  After  reviewing  the  whole  of  O'Connell's 
career  as  a  politician,  an  impartial  observer  will  be  disposed 
to  say  of  him,  that  he  was  a  man  of  a  strong  understanding 
and  of  stronger  feelings,  occupied  incessantly,  and  almost 
always  without  due  preparation,  upon  questions  where  it  would 
liave  perplexed  the  wisest  to  discern  the  exact  medium  be- 
tween disgraceful  submission  and  factious  importunity  —  that 
by  necessity  a  partisan,  he  has  been  steady  to  his  cause,  and 
consistent  in  his  ultimate  object,  though  'many  times  inconsis- 
tent in  the  adoption  of  the  means  to  obtain  it;  and  that  now 
in  the  long  run,  after  all  the  charges  of  violence  and  indiscre- 
tion that  have  been  heaped  upon  him,  it  is  questioned  by  soma 
of  the  clearest  understanding  in  England,  whether,  in  the 
present  state  of  political  morals,  a  more  courtly  policy  than 


88  DANIEL   01CONNFXL. 

O'CoimelFs  either  is,  or  was  ever  calculated  to  advance  tlid 
interests  of  his  body. 

Leaving  his  political  incentives  aside,  and  referring  solely 
to  the  personal  provocations  to  which  he  is  daily  exposed,  I 
should  say,  that  it  would  be  utterly  unnatural  in  such  a  man 
to  be  other  than  violent.  To  O'Connell,  as  a  barrister,  his 
disqualification  is  a  grievous  injustice.  It  is  not  in  theory 
alone  that  it  operates.  It  visits  him  in  the  practical  details 
of  his  professional  life,  and  in  forms  the  most  likely  to  gall  a 
man  of  conscious  powers  and  an  ambitious  temperament. 
He  has  the  mortification  of  being  incessantly  reminded  that, 
for  years  past,  his  fortunes  have  been  absolutely  at  a  dead 
stop,  while  he  was  constantly  condemned  to  see  men  who 
started  with  him  and  after  him,  none  of  them  his  superiors, 
many  of  them  far  beneath  him,  partially  thrust  before  him, 
and  lifted  into  stations  of  honor  and  emolument  to  which  he  is 
forbidden  to  aspire.  The  stoutest  adversary  of  papal  en- 
croachments must  admit,  that  there  is  something  irritating  in 
this;  for  my  part,  instead  of  judging  harshly  of  the  spirit  in 
which  he  retaliates,  I  rather  honor  the  man  for  the  energy 
with  which  he  wrestles  to  the  last  with  the  system  that  would 
keep  him  down;  and  if  now  and  then  his  resistance  assumes 
such  a  form  as  to  be  in  itself  an  evil,  I  am  not  sorry,  for  the 
sake  of  freedom  and  humanity,  to  see  it  proved  that  intolerant 
laws  can  not  be  enforced  without  inconvenience.  But  in  gen- 
eral (to  speak  the  truth)  O'Connell's  vengeance  is  not  of  a  very 
deadly  description.  He  is,  after  all,  a  man  of  a  kindly  and 
forgiving  nature  :  and  where  the  general  interests  of  his  country 
are  not  concerned,  is  disposed  to  resent  his  personal  wrongs 
with  great  command  of  temper.  His  forbearance  in  this  re- 
spect is  really  creditable  to  him,  and  the  more  so  as  it  meets 
with  no  return. 

The  admirers  of  King  William  have  no  mercy  for  a  man, 
who,  in  his  seditious  moods,  is  so  provoking  as  to  tell  the  world 
that  their  idol  was  "  a  Dutch  adventurer."  Then  his  intolera- 
ble success  in  a  profession  where  many  a  stanch  Protestant  is 
condemned  to  starve,  and  his  fashionable  house  in  Merrion- 
square,  and  a  greater  eye  sore  still,  his  dashing  revolutionary 


KEEPS   WITHIN   TIIR    LAW  89 

equipage,  green  carriage,  green  liveries,  and  turbulent  Popish 
steeds,  prancing  over  a  Protestant  pavement  to  the  terror  of 
Protestant  passengers  —  a  nuisance  that  in  the  good  old  times 
would  have  been  put  down  by  Act  of  Parliament — these  and 
other  provocations  of  equal  publicity,  have  exposed  this  learned 
culprit  to  the  deep  and  irrevocable  detestation  of  a  numerous 
class  of  his  Majesty's  hating  subjects  in  Ireland.  And  the 
feeling  is  duly  communicated  to  the  public.  The  loyal  press 
of  Dublin  teems  with  the  most  astounding  imputations  upon  his 
character  and  motives.  As  a  dish  for  the  periodical  libellers 
of  the  day,  O'Oonnell  is  quite  a  cut-and-come-again,  from  the 
crazy  Churchman,  foaming  over  the  apprehended  fall  of  tithes, 
down  to  the  political  striplings  of  the  College,  who,  instead  of 
trying  their  youthful  genius  upon  the  cardinal  virtues,  or  "  che 
lawfulness  of  killing  Caesar,"  devote  their  hours  of  classic 
leisure  to  the  more  laudable  task  of  demonstrating,  for  the 
comfort  of  the  Orange  lodges,  that  "  Counsellor  O'Connell 
carries  on  a  treasonable  correspondence  with  Captain  Rock." 
But  the  Counseller,  who  happens  to  know  a  little  more  of  the 
law  of  high  treason  than  his  accusers,  has  the  good  sense  to 
laugh  at  them  and  their  threats  of  the  hangman.  Now  that 
all  practical  attempts  upon  life  have  been  abandoned,*  he 
bears  the  rest  with  true  Christian  patience  and  contempt ;  and 
whenever  any  of  his  defamers  recant  "  in  extremis'''  and  die 
good  Catholics,  as  the  most  bigoted  among  them  are  said  to 

*  I  allude  to  what  was  really  a  shocking  occurrence.  A  Corporation  has 
been  defined  to  be  "  a  thing-  having  neither  a  body  to  be  kicked  nor  a  soul  to 
be  damned."  With  this  definition  before  him,  Mr.  O'Connell  did  not  imagine 
that  he  exceeded  the  limits  of  public  debate  in  calling  the  Dublin  Corporation 
a  "beggarly  Corporation."  One  of  its  most  needy  members  [Mr.  d'Esterre], 
however,  eitber  volunteered  or  was  incited  to  think  otherwise,  and  called  upon 
the  speaker  to  apologize  or  fight.  To  Mr.  O'Connell,  a  life  of  vital  importance 
to  a  numerous  family,  and  of  great  importance  to  the  best  part  of  the  Irish  pub- 
lic, the  alternative  was  dreadful.  He  saw  the  ferocity  of  the  transaction  in  its 
full  light,  but  he  committed  his  conduct  to  the  decision  of  his  friends,  and  a 
duel  ensued.  The  aggressor  was  killed.  Had  the  result  been  different,  his 
claims  would  probably  not  have  been  overlooked  by  the  patron  of  the  time 
(1815) ;  at  least  such  is  understoou  *r  '^ave  been  the  expectation  under  which 
be  provoked  his  fate. 


90  Daniel  o*connell. 

do,  if  tlie  fact  be  duly  certified  by  bis  friend,  Mr.  Denis  Scully,* 
who  bas  quite  an  instinct  for  collecting  materials  touching  this 
portion  of  secret  history,  O'Oonnell,  I  am  assured,  not  only 
forgives  them  all  their  libels,  but  contributes  liberally  toward 
setting  on  foot  a  few  expiatory  masses  for  their  souls.t 


O'CONNELL    IN    1829. 

It  was  on  a  calm  autumn  evening  that  I  had  returned  from 
a  walk  to  the  splendid  seat  of  Lord  Powerscourt,  in  the  county 
of  Wicklow.  I  had  sat  clown  at  the  inn  of  the  little  village 
where  I  was  sojourning,  and  had  placed  myself  in  the  window, 
to  while  away  an  hour  in  observing  the  "  passing  events"  of 
the  place.  The  market  was  over;  the  people  had  gradually 
passed  to  their  homes  ;  the  busy  hum  of  the  day  was  fast  dying 
away ;  and  a  few  straggling  groups  scattered  here  and  there 
through  the  long,  wide  street  of  the  town  —  the  only  one  it 
boasted  —  were  almost  the  only  persons  who  arrested  my  eye 
The  sun  was  sinking,  and  threw  his  lingering  beams  into  the 
neat  but  ill-furnished  apartment  where  I  was  sitting.  To  avoid 
the  glare  of  his  beams,  I  changed  my  position,  and  this  gave 
me  a  more  uninterrupted  view  of  the  long  street  above  referred 
to,  which  threw  its  termination  into  the  green  fields  of  the 
country. 

Casting  my  eyes  in  this  direction,  I  beheld  a  chariot-and- 
four  coming  toward  me,  enveloped  in  a  complete  cloud  of  dust, 
and  the  panting  horses  of  which  were  urged  on  with  tremen- 

*  The  catholic  barrister,  a  gentleman  quite  clever  and  important  enough 
to  be  treated  of  apart.  For  the  present,  I  shall  merely  record  of  him  that  one 
of  his  favorite  theories  is,  that  no  rank  Orangeman  ever  "  dies  game."  He 
can  tell  you  the  exact  moment  when  Doctor  Duigenan  began  to  roar  out  for  a 
priest.  He  has  a  large  stock  of  mortuary  anecdotes  illustrating  his  general 
doctrine,  and  he  relates  them  with  true  Sardonic  vivacity. 

t  To  this  sketch,  originally  published  in  July,  1823,  I  annex  a  later  por- 
trait, by  Mr.  Curran,  with  additions  by  Mr.  Sheil,  which  appeared  in  March, 
1829,  after  Mr.  O'Connell's  being  elected  M.  P.  for  Clai'e,  and  on  tie  eve  ot 
catholic  emancipation,  carried  in  the  following  month,  by  Wellington.- — M. 


tfIS    OTTTER    ASPECT.  91 

•ions  rapidity.  Struck  with  the  unexpected  arrival  of  such  a 
vehicle  in  that  place,  I  leaned  out  of  the  window  to  observe 
its  destination,  and  beheld  it  still  rolling-  hurriedly  along,  and 
sweeping  round  the  angle  of  the  street  toward  the  inn  with  an 
increased  violence.  If  my  reader  has  been  much  used  to  trav- 
elling, he  will  be  aware  that  the  moment  a  postillion  comes  in 
sight  of  an  inn,  he  is  sure  to  call  forth  the  mettle  of  his  horses 
— perhaps  to  show  off  the  blood  of  his  cattle.*  This  was  the 
case  at  present,  and  a  quick  gallop  brought  the  vehicle  in  thun- 
dering noise  to  the  door,  where,  Shenstone  says,  is  to  be  found 
"the  warmest  welcome."  The  animals  were  sharply  checked, 
the  door  was  flung  open,  and  the  occupier  threw  himself  hur- 
riedly out. 

''Bring  out  four  horses  instantly,"  was  the  command  he  ut- 
tered in  the  loud  voice  of  haste  and  authority. 

The  inmate  of  the  carriage  was  about  five  feet  eleven  and  a 
half  inches  high,  and  wore  a  portly,  stout,  hale,  and  agreeable 
appearance.  His  shoulders  were  broad,  and  his  legs  stoutly 
built,  and,  as  he  at  that  moment  stood,  one  arm  in  his  side- 
pocket,  the  other  thrust  into  a  waistcoat,  which  was  almost 
completely  unbuttoned  from  the  heat  of  the  day,  he  would 
bave  made  a  good  figure  for  the  rapid  but  fine-finishing  pencil 
of  Harlowe.f  His  head  was  covered  with  a  light  fur-cap, 
which,  partly  thrown  back,  displayed  that  breadth  of  forehead 

*  The  readers  of  fiction  will  be  reminded  of  one  of  Miss  Edgeworth's 
stories,  in  which  she  makes  an  Irish  postillion,  whose  horses  were  weak  and 
weaiy  after  a  long  journey,  rally  them  up  as  he  entered  a  gentleman's  demesne, 
which  he  called  having  "  a  gallop  for  the  avenue." — M. 

t  George  Henry  Harlowe,  born  in  London  in  1787,  was  first  the  pupil  and 
afterward  the  rival  of  Sir  Thomas  Lawrence,  the  eminent  portrait-painter.  He 
painted  some  clever  historical  pictures,  of  which  the  best  known  is  "  The  Trial 
of  Queen  Catherine,"  in  which  there  are  portraits  of  Mrs.  Siddons,  with  her 
brothers,  John  and  Charles  Kemble,  and  other  theatrical  celebrities.  Of  this 
even  an  engraving  is  rare  and  valuable.  The  original  hangs,  neglected  and 
ancared  for,  in  a  store-loft,  in  Soho  Square,  at  London,  belonging  to  a  piano- 
forte maker.  After  visiting  Italy,  where  his  accuracy  as  a  copyist,  and  hi3  re- 
markable facility  in  original  works,  excited  much  admiration,  and  obtained  him, 
at  Rome  and  at  Florence,  the  highest  honors  artists  could  bestow  on  him, 
Harlowe  returned  to  London,  and  died  thei'e,  a  few  months  after,  in  1819.  Hia 
skill,  in  rapidly  sketching  a  likeness  and  in  seizing  the  character  of  a  face,  ha* 
rarely  been  equalled. —  M. 


92  DAKIEL   O'CONNELL. 

which  I  have  never  yet  seen  absent  from  real  talent.  His  eyes 
appeared  to  me,  at  that  instant,  to  be  between  a  light-blue  and 
a  gray  color.  His  face  was  pale  and  sallow,  as  if  the  turmoil 
of  business,  the  shade  of  care,  or  the  study  of  midnight,  had 
chased  away  the  glow  of  health  and  youth.  Around  his  mouth 
played  a  cast  of  sarcasm,  which,  to  a  quick  eye,  at  once  be- 
trayed satire ;  and  it  appeared  as  if  the  lips  could  be  easily 
resolved  into  the  risus  sardonicus.  His  head  was  somewhat 
larger  than  that  which  a  modern  doctrine  denominates  the 
"  medium  size  ;"  and  it  was  well  supported  by  a  stout  and  well- 
foundationed  pedestal,  which  was  based  on  a  breast,  full,  round, 
prominent,  and  capacious.  The  eye  was  shaded  by  a  brow 
which  I  thought  would  be  more  congenial  to  sunshine  than 
storm  ;  and  the  nose  was  neither  Grecian  nor  Roman,  but  was 
large  enough  to  readily  admit  him  into  the  chosen  band  of  that 
"  immortal  rebel"  (as  Lord  Byron  called  Cromwell)  who  chose 
his  body-guard  with  capacious  lungs  and  noses,  as  affording 
greater  capability  of  undergoing  toil  and  hardship.  Altogether 
he  appeared  to  possess  strong  physical  powers. 

He  was  dressed  in  an  olive-brown  surtout,  black  trowsers, 
and  black  waistcoat.  His  cravat  was  carelessly  tied,  and  the 
knot  almost  undone,  from  the  heat  of  the  day  ;  and  as  he  stood 
with  his  hand  across  his  bosom,  and  his  eyes  bent  on  the 
ground,  he  was  the  very  picture  of  a  "public  character,"  hur- 
rying away  on  some  important  matter  which  required  all  of 
personal  exertion  and  mental  energy.  Often  as  I  have  seen 
him  since,  I  have  never  beheld  him  in  so  striking  or  pictorial 
an  attitude. 

"  Quick  with  the  horses !"  was  his  hurried  ejaculation  as  he 
recovered  himself  from  his  revery,  and  flung  himself  into  his 
carriage.  The  whip  was  cracked,  and  away  went  the  chariot 
with  the  same  cloud  of  dust,  and  the  same  tremendous  pace. 

I  did  not  see  him  pay  any  money.  He  did  not  enter  the 
inn.  He  called  for  no  refreshment,  nor  did  he  utter  a  word  to 
any  person  around  him.  He  seemed  to  be  obeyed  by  instinct; 
and  while  I  marked  the  chariot  thundering  along  the  street, 
which  had  all  its  then  spectators  turned  on  the  cloud-enveloped 
vehicle,  my  curiosity  was  intensely  excited,  and  I  instantly 


AS    A    MOB-SPEAKER.  93 

descended  to  learn  the  name  of  the  extraordinary  stranger. 
Most  mal-ajpmpos,  however,  were  my  inquiries.  Unfortunately, 
the  landlord  was  out ;  the  waiter  could  not  tell  me  his  name  ; 
and  the  hostler  "knew  nothing  whatsomever  of  him,  except 
that  he  was  in  the  most  uncommonest  hurry."  A  short  time, 
however,  satisfied  my  curiosity. 

The  next  clay  brought  me  to  the  capital  of  the  county  where 
I  was  then  on  a  visit.  It  was  the  assize  time.  Very  fond  of 
oratory,  I  went  to  the  courthouse  to  hear  the  forensic  eloquence 
of  the  "Home  Circuit."  I  had  scarcely  seated  myself,  when 
the  same  grayish  eye,  broad  forehead,  portly  figure,  and  strong 
tone  of  voice,  arrested  my  attention.  He  was  just  on  the  mo- 
ment of  addressing  the  jury,  and  I  anxiously  waited  to  hear 
the  speech  of  a  man  who  had  already  so  strongly  interested 
me.  After  looking  at  the  judge  steadily  for  a  moment,  he  be- 
gan his  speech  exactly  in  the  following  pronunciation  :  "  My 
Lurrd  —  Gentlemen  of  the  jury." 

"  Who  speaks  V  instantly  demanded  I. 

"  Counsellor  O'Connell,"  was  the  reply. 

"Why,  he  only  arrived  last  night?" 

"Late  last  night,  and  has  had  scarcely  a  moment  to  con 
over  his  brief.     But  listen." 

I  at  once  fixed  my  attention.  As  I  do  not  write  short-hand, 
I  can  not  give  the  detail  of  his  speech ;  but  his  delivery  I  can 
criticise,  and  can  here  write  down. 

Were  O'Connell  addressing  a  mixed  assembly  where  the 
lower  orders  predominated,  I  scarcely  know  any  one  who 
would  have  such  a  power  of  wielding  the  passions.  He  has  a 
knack  of  speaking  to  a  mob  which  I  have  never  heard  exceed- 
ed. His  manner  has  at  times  the  rhodomontade  of  Hunt;* 
but  he  is  infinitely  superior,  of  course,  to  this  well-known  dem- 
ocrat in  choice  of  language  and  power  of  expression.  The 
same  remark  may  apply,  were  I  to  draw  any  comparison  be- 
tween him   and    another  well-known  mob-speaker,  Cobbett.f 

*  Henry  Hunt,  for  some  years  the  leader  of  the  "  Radical  Reform"  party  in 
England. —  M. 

t  William  Cobbett,  who  will  be  remembered  ae  the  most  inconsistent  poli- 
ticise, and  the  most  nervous  writer  of  English  prose,  his  time  ]  roduced.—  ftf, 


94  DANIEL    o'cONNELL. 

Were  lie  opposed  to  these  two  persons  in  any  assembly  of  the 
people,  lie  would  infallibly  prove  himself  the  victor.  A  balcony 
outside  a  high  window,  and  a  large  mob  beneath  him,  is  the 
very  spot  for  O'Oonnell.  There  he  would  be  best  seen,  and 
his  powers  and  person  best  observed  ;  but  were  he  in  the  House 
of  Commons,  I  do  not  think  I  am  incorrect  when  I  say  that 
he  would  make  little  impression  on  the  House,  supposing  he 
were  heard  with  every  prepossession  in  his  favor.*  His  actkn 
wants  grace  and  suavity  —  qualities  so  eminently  fascinating 
in  an  elegant  and  classical  speaker,  but  which  perhaps  are 
overlooked  in  an  "  orator  of  the  people."  The  motions  of  his 
body  are  often  sharp  and  angular.  His  arms  swing  about  un- 
gracefully ;  and  at  times  the  right  hand  plays  slovenly  with 
his  watch-chain. 

Though  I  shall  not,  perhaps,  find  many  to  agree  with  me, 
yet  I  am  free  to  confess  that  he  does  not  appear  to  me  to  pos- 
sess that  very  rare  gift — genuine  satire.  He  wants  the  culti- 
vated grace  of  language  which  his  compeer,  Sheil,  possesses, 
and  the  brilliancy  of  metaphor.  None  is  there  else,  however, 
peer  or  commoner,  who'  can  compete  with  him  in  the  Catholic 
Association.  His  language  is  often  coarse,  and  seldom  elegant. 
Strong,  fierce,  and  perhaps  bold,  it  often  is  ;  but  vituperation 
and  personality  make  up  too  much  of  the  materiel.  His  voice 
is  sometimes  harsh  and  dissonant  ;  and  I  could  wish  more  of 
that  round,  full,  mellow  tone,  which  is  essential  to  a  good 
delivery,  and  which  so  captivates  the  ear.  "The  voice  is  the 
key  which  unlocks  the  heart,"  says  Madam  Roland.  I  believe 
it.  Let  the  reader  listen  to  the  fine  round  voice  of  Lord  Chief 
Justice  Bushe,  and  then  let  him  hear  the  sometimes  grating 
tones  of  O'Oonnell,  and  he  will  soon  perceive  the  difference. 
The  voice  of  the  latter  much  reminds  me  of  the  harsh  thinness 
of  Mr.  J.  D.  Latouche's  f  (whos,e  conversational  tone,  by-the-by, 

*  This  was  a  "  foregone  conclusion"  to  which  facts  gave  a  strong  negative. 
O'Oonnell  became  one  of  the  best  speakers  in  the  House  of  Commons,  and  his 
speech,  in  1831,  on  the  Reform  Bill,  was  the  ablest  on  the  subject.  As  "  Mem 
ber  for  all  Ireland,"  with  forty  votes  at  his  command,  his  power  in  the  House 
was  great. —  M. 

t  Mr.  Latouche  was  an  eminent  banker  in  Dublin,  who  sometimes  tried  to 
t#ke  a  leading  part  in  politics. —  M, 


PLEADING   BEFORE    THE    VICEROY.  95 

is  far  beyond  his  oratorical  one);  and  yet  the  coolness  and 
the  astuteness  which  the  latter  gentleman  possesses  in  an 
argument,  would  be  no  bad  substitute  for  the  headlong  impet- 
uosity and  violent  sarcasm  in  which  O'Connell  sometimes 
indulges. 

As  he  can  not  clothe  his  language  in  the  same  elegance  as 
Sheil,  he  consequently  can  not  give  the  same  insinuation  to 
his  discourses.  In  this  respect,  his  contemporary  has  greatly 
the  advantage.  Sheil  gives  us  the  poetry  of  eloquence  — 
O'Connell  gives  us  the  prose.  The  attempts  of  the  latter  at  wit 
are  clumsy,  while  the  former  can  bring  both  that  and  metaphor 
to  his  aid,  and  he  often  uses  them  with  much  effect.  O'Con- 
nell, however,  can  attempt  humor  with  effect,  and  he  has  a 
peculiar  tact  in  suiting  this  humor  to  the  Irish  people.  I  have 
not  often  seen  a  good  exordium  from  O'Connell  —  an  integral 
portion  of  a  discourse  which  it  is  extremely  difficult  to  make; 
and  I  think  his  perorations  want  grace,  point,  and  force,  and 
that  which  the  Italians  would  denominate  "  espressivo." 

I  shall  follow  him  still  farther. 

The  next  place  at  which  I  heard  the  arch-leader  of  Cathol- 
icism, was  at  the  council-chamber  in  Dublin  castle,  where  he 
was  employed  to  argue  a  case  before  the  then  Viceroy,  Marquis 
Wellesley.*  His  speech,  voice,  action,  eye  (for  nothing  in 
oratory  escapes  me),  are  as  clearly  before  me  at  present  as 
they  were  on  that  day  ;  and  if  this  should  catch  his  eye,  I 
would  call  it  to  his  memory  by  saying  it  was  one  of  the  best 
speeches  he    ever   made.      Mr.  Goulburn,t   who    sat    at    the 

*  Richard  Colley  Wellesley,  eldest  son  of  the  earl  of  Mornington  (composer 
of  the  well-known  glee,  "Here  in  cool  grot"),  and  brother  of  Arthur,  duke  of 
Wellington,  was  created  Marquis  Wellesley  for  his  services  in  India,  as 
Governor-General,  and  was  twice  Lord  Lieutenant  of  L'cland.  He  died  in 
1842,  in  the  eighty-third  year  of  his  age. —  M. 

{"  Henry  Goulburn,  now  M.  P.  for  Cambridge  University,  was  born  in  1784, 
and,  besides  initiatory  offices,  held  the  Colonial  Seals  from  1812  till  1821  :  was 
Secretary  for  Ireland  (and  very  unpopular)  from  December,  1821  til]  1828: 
Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer  from  1828  till  1830:  Secretary  for  the  Home 
'Department  from  December,  1834  to  April,  1835  (Peel's  brief  administration), 
f»nd  again  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer,  under  Peel,  from  1841  to  184(>- 
Though  a  Conservative,  he  voted  for  Reform  and   Fret1  Trade.     An  ultra-Antj- 


96  DANIEL    O'CONNELL. 

lowermost  end  of  the  table,  on  the  right  of  the  Lord-Lieuten- 
ant, was  busily  employed  in  taking  notes.  The  person  who 
eat  next  the  Chief-Secretary,  was  Lord  (then  Mr.)  Plunket ; 
but  he  merely  kept  his  eyes  fixed  on  the  broad  green  cloth 
which  spread  amply  before  him,  and,  with  his  arms  folded, 
scarcely  moved  from  that  position  the  entire  time.  Lord 
Wellesley  was  at  the  top  of  the  table,  dressed  in  his  orders; 
and,  as  he  was  of  the  same  opinion  in  politics  with  the  person 
who  was  speaking,  he  seemed  to  listen  to  him  with  much 
pleasure.  His  words,  tone  of  voice,  and  action,  seemed  more 
strictly  attended  to  than  when  I  heard  him  at  Wicklow  :  and 
even  his  step  in  the  ante-rooms,  on  passing  to  the  chamber,  was 
also  guarded.  Into  that  chamber  he  could  not  come  in  the 
same  hurried  careless  manner,  in  which  I  have  sometimes  seen 
him  fling  himself  into  court.  One  day,  while  lounging  in  the 
latter  place,  I  saw  him  rapidly  fling  aside  the  green  curtain  at 
the  doorway;  and  as  he  dashed  down  the  benches  to  the  front 
of  the  bar  methought  he  would  have  almost  strode  over  the 
thick  files  of  lawyers,  attorneys,  clerks,  witnesses,  &c,  who 
chanced  to  be  in  his  way. 

In  Avalking  through  the  streets,  he  pushes  along  in  the 
same  careless,  democratic  manner;  and  his  stout,  tall  figure, 
enables  him  to  shoulder  aside  the  crowds  that  might  oppose 
his  hurried  march.  He  seems  not  to  recollect  that  the  slow 
pace  is  the  pace  of  the  gentleman;  on  he  goes,  business  and 
emancipation  borne  mightily  on  his  broad  shoulders ;  and 
stops  not,  nor  stays,  till  he  gets  to  the  Four  Courts ;  from  the 
Four  Courts  he  is  then  off  to  the  Association  rooms  —  from 
the  Association  to  the  Four  Courts  back  again — from  the 
Courts  to  attend  some  popular  assembly,  or  keep  an  appoint- 
ment—  from  the  assembly  to  his  house  to  dine  —  then  a  hearty 
dinner  and  a  temperate  glass  —  business,  parchments,  briefs; 
attorneys'  clerks,  and  "unfledged  lawyers"  afterward  —  retir- 
ing early  to  bed  —  and  then,  next  day,  behold  him  going 
through  the  same  endless,  important,  and  weighty  routine  of 
business  again. 

Catholic  for  many  years,  be  voted  for  Catholic  Emancipation,  in  1829,  at  the 
bjddir^  of  bis  master,  the  J)\i\e  yf  Wellington, —  M, 


A    DAliING    ACT.  97 

The  setting-up  for  Clare  was  the  most  daring,  and  the  bold- 
est step  which  this  man  ever  took,  or  ever  will  take.  Were  he 
to  live  a  century,  he  could  do  nothing  which  would  show  so 
much  of  daring  and  intrepid  talent.  He  has  been  blamed  for 
it ;  but  the  power,  and  the  ambition,  and  the  boldness,  which 
it  has  evinced,  makes  me  admire  where  I  am  otherwise  obliged 
to  condemn.  It  was  one  of  those  steps  that  (to  use  the  words 
of  Voltaire)  "  vulgar  men  would  term  rash,  but  great  men  would 
call  bold."  Let  me  distinguish  it  from  his  mission  to  England.* 
This  last  was  a  foolish  step,  but  the  first  Avas  an  intrepid  one. 
Men  of  talent  forsook  him  in  the  last,  but  they  supported  and 
abided  by  him  in  the  first.  In  short,  the  whole  of  Ireland  was 
thrown  into  astonishment. 

The  last  time  I  sawO'Oonnell  was  in  St.  James's  park.  He 
had  a  long  scroll  under  his  arm  —  mayhap  that  which  has 
since  caused  such  controversy,  "  the  wings."  The  next  time 
I  see  him  will  perhaps  be  in  that,  to  me,  most  interesting  spot 
in  London,  or  in  all  England  —  St.  Stephen's. 

*  The  visit  of  the  Catholic  Deputation  to  England  in   1S25,  or  which  a  fi»U 
account  is  in  these  sketches. —  M. 

Vol.  I.— 5 


WILLIAM   CONYNGHAM   PLUNKET. 

kiR.  Plunket's  father  was  a  Presbyterian  clergyman  in  tbr 
R  rtli  of  Ireland.*  He  died  during  the  infancy  of  his  children 
lewing  them  and  his  widow  without  any  provision  :  but  learn- 
ing has  always  been  cheap  in  Ireland,  and  Mrs.  Plunket  con- 
trived to  procure  for  her  sons  a  classical  education.  The  sub- 
ject of  the  present  notice  was,  at  an  early  age,  befriended  by 
the  late  Lord  Avonmore.  I  have  conversed  with  one  or  two 
persons  who  recollect  to  have  seen  him  a  constant  inmate  at 
his  Lordship's  house,  and  their  report  of  him  is,  that  "he  was 
a  clever,  hard-headed  boy,  very  attentive  to  his  studies,  and 
very  negligent  of  his  person."  He  passed  in  due  course  through 
Trinity  College,  Dublin ;  and  was  called  to  the  Irish  bar  in 
1787.  His  professional  advancement  was  rapid  and  steady. 
The  first  public  notice  that  I  can  find  of  his  name  is  upon  the 
trial  of  the  Sheareses,  in  1798  :t  he  was  associated  with  Cur- 

*  He  eventually  settled  in  Dublin,  vrhere  he  became  stated  minister  of  a  con 
gregation.  He  was  fond  of  polemical  discussion,  but  when  it  was  becoming 
fierce,  as  too  often  is  the  case,  would  say,  "  Well,  let  us  leave  it  to  Bridget," 
who  was  a  simple-minded  lass  from  Wales.  Her  reply  commonly  was,  "  Well, 
sir,  if  you  will  have  my  judgment,  I  do  think  that  love  to  God  and  love  to  man 
are  not  fuel  for  hell-fire."  'lnere  is  philosophy,  as  well  as  truth  and  humanity, 
in  this  plain  declaration.  —  M. 

t  John  and  Henry  Sheares  were  natives  of  Cork.  They  were  well  educated 
and  well  connected.  John,  the  younger,  who  was  a  republican,  joined  the  Uni- 
ted Irishmen  in  1796.  Henry,  a  man  of  amiable  disposition  and  easily  influ- 
enced, followed  the  example.  Both  had  been  to  France,  at  the  taking  of  the 
Bastille  ;  and  John  was  seen,  on  his  return,  to  flourish,  with  exultation,  a  hand- 
kerchief stained  with  the  blood  of  Louis  XVI.  John  Sheares  was  very  active 
in  the  preparations  for  the  outbreak  in  1798,  writing  the  greater  part  of  the  va- 
rious addresses  issued  by  the  Directory.     The  Sheares's  accession  to  the  popular 


TRIAL    OF   THE    SHEARESKS.  99 

ran  and  Ponsonby  in  tlie  defence  of  the  unfortunate  brothers, 
and,  like  them,  vainly  urged  every  topic  that  legal  ingenuity 
could  devise  to  avert  their  doom.  I  am  not  aware  that  Mr. 
Plunket  appeared  as  counsel  for  the  prisoners  in  any  subse- 
quent state-trial.  He  became  a  member  of  the  Irish  Parlia- 
ment in  1797.*  On  the  question  of  the  Union,  he  took  the  side 
of  his  country  :  his  speeches  on  that  occasion  contain  many  fine 
specimens  of  reasoning,  invective,  and  deliberate  enthusiasm. 
A  single  sentence  will  convey  an  idea  of  their  general  spirit  : 
"For  me,  I  do  not  hesitate  to  declare,  that  if  the  madness  of 

cause,  which  was  soon  suspected,  was  ascertained  by  a  militia-captain,  named 
Armstrong,  who  wormed  himself  into  their  confidence,  to  betray  them  to  the 
Government.  On  the  evidence  of  Armstrong,  who  had  been  on  visiting  terms  at 
their  house,  and  an  accessory  in  their  councils,  the  case  against  the  brothers 
was  proved  —  though  it  condemned  himself  to  an  immortality  of  infamy.  The 
trial  came  off,  on  July  12,  1798,  before  Lord  Chief-Justice  Carleton  and  four 
other  Judges.  Curran,  Plunket,  and  Ponsonby,  were  the  chief  counsel  for  the 
prisoners.  After  the  trial  had  lasted  sixteen  hours,  Cuiran,  exhausted  in  mind 
and  body,  requested  its  postponement  until  the  next  morning.  Attorney-Gen- 
eral Toler  (afterward  Lord  Norbury),  on  the  part  of  the  Crown,  refused  to  consent 
to  any  adjournment.  At  midnight,  therefore,  Curran  had  to  speak  ;  and,  wea- 
ried as  he  was,  made  an  eloquent  defence.  The  next  morning,  at  eight  o'clock, 
a  verdict  of  "  Guilty"  was  returned.  The  brothers  rushed  into  each  other's 
arms.  When  called  up  for  judgment,  at  three  o'clock  the  same  day,  Henry, 
overcome  by  emotion,  was  unable  to  speak.  John,  more  firm,  made  only  one 
request,  that  "  the  husband,  the  father,  the  brother,  the  son,  all  comprised  in 
one  prrson,"  should  receive,  not  a  pardon,  which  it  was  not  in  the  power  of 
the  Court  to  grant,  but  a  brief  respite.  The  request  availed  not.  Toler  moved 
that  the  sentence  of  death  should  be  earned  into  execution  the  next  day  —  and 
so  it  was,  in  front  of  the  prison  in  Green  street.  By  the  common  law  of  Eng- 
land, two  witnesses  were  necessary  to  convict  in  cases  of  treason  ;  and  so  Coke 
and  Blackstone  have  held;  but  the  Irish  Court  decided  that  only  one  was  requi- 
site in  Ireland,  and  that  one  was  Armstrong  the  informer.  So,  as  Curran  stated, 
"  that  which  in  Ireland  might  be  legally  done,  in  England  it  would  be  murder 
to  do."  At  present,  the  law  is  the  same  in  Ireland  as  in  England.  — Eventu- 
ally, the  remains  of  these  unfortunate  men  were  deposited  in  the  vaults  beneath 
the  Church  of  St.  Michan's,  Dublin,  where  the  soil  and  the  atmosphere  resist 
decomposition,  and  might  there  be  seen,  for  over  forty  years,  by  any  one  who 
paid  the  sexton.  In  January,  1842,  the  bodies  were  saved  from  further  pub- 
licity by  being  placed  in  coffins  of  oak  and  lead.  —  M. 

*  Plunket  was  brought  into  Parliament  by  the  Earl  of  Charlemont  (born  in 
1728,  died  1799),  whose  name  will  live,  in  history,  as  the  popular  leader  of  the 
Irish  Volunteers  of  1782.  — M. 


100  WILLIAM    CONYNGHAM    TLUNKET. 

the  revolutionist  should  tell  me,  'You  must  sacrifice  British 
connection,' I  would  adhere  to  that  connection  in  preference  to 
the  independence  of  my  country  ;  but  I  have  as  little  hesita- 
tion in  saying,  that,  if  the  wanton  ambition  of  a  minister  should 
assault  the  freedom  of  Ireland  and  compel  me  to  the  alterna- 
tive, I  would  fling  the  connection  to  the  winds,  and  I  would 
clasp  the  independence  of  my  country  to  my  heart."  But  in 
those  days,  as  was  remarked,  "the  voice  of  the  patriot  in  the 
senate  was  answered  by  no  echo  from  without."  The  nation 
was  panic-struck  ;  gold  and  promises  were  profusely  scattered  ; 
the  majority  of  the  "Honorable  House"  were  impatient  to  be 
s  dd,  though  the  wages  of  their  sin  was  death.  The  people 
had  nothing  to  offer  but  gratitude  and  fame  —  the  minister  had 
titles,  offices,  and  pensions;  and  the  Irish  Parliament  was 
knocked  down  to  the  highest  bidder. 

In  1803,  Mr.  Plunket  appeared  as  one  of  the  counsel  for  the 
prosecution  on  the  trial  of  Mr.  Robert  Emmett.*     One  particu- 

*  There  were  three  Emmetts,  sons  of  Dr.  Emmett,  who  had  been  state-physi 
eian  at  Dublin,  and  was  an  extreme  liberal  in  his  political  opinions.  Temple, 
the  eldest,  who  distinguished  himself  in  the  University  and  at  the  bar,  died  at 
the  age  of  thirty.  Thomas  Addis,  born  in  1764,  also  became  a  barrister,  got 
involved  in  the  revolt  of  1798,  was  allowed  to  expatriate  himself,  arrived  at 
New  York  in  1804,  where  he  was  at  once  admitted  to  practice  (by  special  dis- 
pensation, although  opposed,  Phillips  says,  by  Chancellor  Kent),  became  Attor- 
ney-General of  New  York  in  1812,  and  died  in  1827,  greatly  respected  and 
lamented.  Robert,  who  was  only  twenty-three  years  old,  joined  in  the  insur- 
rection of  June  23,  1803  ;  was  tried,  condemned,  and  executed  —  lamented  even 
by  multitudes  who  disliked  his  politics.  Robert  Emmett's  defence,  as  it  is 
called,  though  actually  spoken  after  condemnation,  when  called  on  to  receive 
judgment,  is  one  of  the  most  touching  and  pathetic  specimens  of  eloquence 
ever  uttered.  In  that,  he  alluded  to  his  father's  early  political  instructions, 
when  he  exclaimed,  "  If  the  spirits  of  the  illustrious  dead  participate  in  the 
concerns  of  those  who  were  dear  to  them  in  this  transitory  scene,  dear  shade 
of  my  venerated  father !  look  down  on  your  suffering  son,  and  see  has  he  for  a 
moment  deviated  from  those  moral  and  patriotic  principles  which  you  so  e;»ly 
inculcated  into  his  youthful  mind,  and  for  which  he  has  now  to  offer  up  his 
life  !"  And  who  can  forget  the  pathetic  earnestness  of  his  request  that  no  man 
would  write  his  epitaph,  and  the  hope  that  his  tomb  would  remain  uninscribed 
until  other  men  and  other  times  could  do  justice  to  his  character !  "  When  my 
country  take*  her  place,"  said  he,  "  among  the  nations  of  the  earth,  then,  and 
not  till  then,  let  my  epitaph  be  written." — M. 


TRIAL   OF   ROBERT   EMttKfT.  101 

lar  of  his  conduct  on  that  occasion  exposed  him  to  great,  and, 
as  it  appears  to  me,  most  unmerited  reproach.  The  unfortu- 
nate prisoner  made  no  defence  —  in  truth,  he  had  none  to 
make  :  he  produced  no  evidence,  and  his  counsel  announced 
that  they  would  state  no  case  to  the  jury.  On  this  ground, 
they  contended  that,  the  counsel  for  the  Crown  should  not  he 
allowed  to  address  the  jury  a  second  time.  Mr.  Plnnket  in- 
sisted upon  his  right :  the  Court  decided  the  question  in  his 
favor,  'and  he  proceeded  to  comment  at  length  upon  the  con- 
duct of  the  prisoner,  and  upon  the  wildness  and  guilt  of  the 
conspiracy  of  which  he  had  been  the  projector.  Emmett's 
youth  and  talents,  and  his  deportment  on  his  trial,  excited  uni- 
versal sympathy  :  almost  all,  even  those  wTho  would  not  con- 
sent to  spare  him,  pitied  him  as  a  victim  —  many  admired  and 
deplored  him  as  a  martyr.  The  latter  exclaimed  against  Mr. 
Plnnket's  exercise  of  his  privilege  to  speak  to  the  evidence,  as 
an  act  of  gratuitous  inhumanity.  I  confess  I  see  the  matter  in 
quite  another  light :  Mr.  Plnnket  was  a  public  man,  whose 
opinions  had  great  weight  with  the  community  ;  and  I  conceive 
it  to  have  been  both  natural  and  laudable  that  he  should  have 
seized  the  opportunity  of  reprobating,  in  the  most  emphatic 
terms,  the  visionary  projects  of  revolution  that  still  prevailed 
Curran,  from  a  similar  impulse  of  public  duty,  had  done  the 
same  thing,  a  few  days  before,  on  the  defence  of  Owen  Kir- 
wan,  where  we  find  him  digressing  from  the  immediate  case 
before  the  jury,  into  an  elaborate  and  glowing  exposition  of 
the  guilt  and  hopelessness  of  attempting  to  better  the  condition 
of  Ireland  by  force.  But  the  enemies  of  Mr.  Plnnket  were  not 
satisfied  with  a  general  assertion  that  his  conduct  had  been 
unnecessarily  harsh.  To  affix  a  deep  stigma  upon  his  charac- 
ter, it  was  industriously  circulated  that  he  had  been  a  constant 
guest  of  Emmett's  father,  at  whose  table  he  had  inculcated  po- 
litical principles  upon  the  son  which  now  brought  him  to  the 
grave  ;  and,  to  give  credit  to  the  calumny,  a  passage  was  inter- 
polated in  the  report,  of  Emmett's  address  to  the  Court,*  in  which 

*  No  allusion  to  Plu  iket  was  made  by  Robert  Emmett  —  and  Phillips,  whr 
examined  the  charge  very  closely,  declares  "  Emmett  never  did  so  with  truth, 
nor  could  he  have  done  so  with  truth."     So  far  from  being-  on  intimate  terms 


102  WILLIAM   CONYNGHAM   PLUNKET. 

the  dying  enthusiast  Mas  made  to  pronounce  a  Litter  invec- 
tive against  "  the  viper  that  his  father  had  nurtured  in  his 
bosom." 

Mr.  Plunket  was  compelled  to  resort  to  a  public  vindication 
of  his  character.  He  instituted  legal  proceedings  against  a 
London  journal  in  which  the  libel  was  inserted,  and  obtained 
a  verdict:*  he  also  published  an  affidavit,  positively  denying 
every  material  fact  in  the  accusation.  He  might  have  gone 
farther,  and  have  truly  sworn  that  the  accusation  was  never 
made  until  after  the  supposed  accuser  was  in  his  grave.  I 
have  conversed  with  several  who  were  present  at  the  trial,  one 
or  two  of  them  friends  and  admirers  of  Emmett  :  they  all 
solemnly  assured  me,  that  not  a  syllable  escaped  his  lips  bear- 
ing the  remotest  allusion  to  the  charge;  and  the  omission  in 
Mr.  Plunket's  affidavit  of  this  conclusive  circumstance,  was 
pointed  out  to  me  as  a  singular  absence  of  sagacity,  in  a  man 
so  notoriously  sharp-sighted  where  the  concerns  of  others  are 
confided  to  his  care.  I  should  not  have  dwelt  thus  long  upon 
this  transaction,  were  it  not  that  "  Mr.  Plunket's  conduct  to 
Robert  Emmett"  is,  to  this  day,  frequently  adverted  to  by  per- 
sons unacquainted  with  the  particulars,  as  an  indelible  blemish 
upon  his  reputation. f 

with  the  Emmett  family,  it  is  stated  (in  the  Memoir  of  Plunket  in  the  Dublin 
University  Magazine  for  March,  1840)  that  he  did  not  know  them  personally, 
and  had  only  once  met  any  of  them,  Thomas  Addis  Emmett,  at  a  public  din- 
ner.—M. 

*  It  was  against  William  Cobbett  that  Plunket  brought  the  action,  and  ob- 
tained smart  damages.  This  may  account  for  Cobbett's  constant  and  bitter 
attacks  on  him,  in  later  years.  In  the  Union  debate,  in  1800,  Plunket,  who 
was  an  Anti-Unionist,  made  a  very  striking  speech,  which  contained  the  follow 
ing  strong  sentence,  among  others :  "  For  my  part,  I  will  resist  it  [the  Union] 
to  the  last  gasp  of  my  existence,  and  with  the  last  drop  of  my  blood  ;  and  when 
I  feel  the  hour  of  my  dissolution  approaching,  i"  will,  like  the  father  of  Hanni- 
bal, take  my  children  to  the  altar,  and  swear  tlcem  to  eternal  hostility  against 
the  invaders  of  their  country's  freedom"  Thirty  years  later,  when  Plunket  had 
accepted  a  peerage  and  office  from  the  Saxons  whom  he  had  thus  denounced, 
Cobbett  had  fair  game  in  him,  and  did  not  spare  the  lash.  Enumerating  the 
variety  of  public  offices,  in  Church  and  State,  to  which  the  Plunkets  had  been 
appointed,  Cobbett  constantly  spoke  of  the  Hannibals  and  their  father  Hamil- 
car  Plunket ! —  M. 

t  Charles  Phillips,  who  defends  him,  yet  admits  that  Plunket  "  made  a  very 


HIS    OFFICIAL    ANTECEDENTS.  103 

Mr.  Plunket  was  made  solicitor-general  in  .1803,  and  attor- 
ney-general and  a  privy  counsellor  in  1805.  He  retained  his 
place  when  the  whigs  came  into  office,  in  1806.  I  believe  that 
this  was  the  commencement  of  his  connection  with  Lord  Gren- 
ville,  to  whose  party  he  has  since  adhered.  After  the  death 
of  Mr.  Fox,  it  was  intimated  to  him  that  the  new  administra- 
tion had  no  intention  of  superseding  him,  but  he  preferred  to 
follow  the  fortunes  of  Lord  Grenville,  and  resigned.  Since 
1812,  he  has  sat  in  the  Imperial  Parliament,  as  a  member  for 
the  university  of  Dublin. 

Mr.  Plunket  has  for  some  years  past  confined  himself  to  the 
Court  of  Chancery,  where  he  holds  the  same  pre-eminence 
that  Romilly  f  did  in  England.     Of  all  the  eminent  lawyers  I 

unnecessary  speech,  as  Emmett  scarcely  denied  his  guilt,"  but  Plunket's  own 
excuse  was  that  he  thought  himself  called  upon  not  so  much  to  address  the 
Jury,  as  the  country  through  the  Jury.  In  1819,  he  repeated  that  "  the  times 
rendered  it  necessary."  Phillips,  again  referring  to  the  case  in  1851,  declares 
that  if  a  speech  were  necessaiy  it  should  have  been  made,  not  by  Plunket  but 
by  Mr.  M'Cleland,  who  as  solicitor-general  was  next  in  rotation.  It  was  also 
said  that  Plunket  had  volunteered  his  exertions :  on  the  contrary,  they  were 
specially  solicited  by  the  first  law  officer  of  the  crown.  Dr.  Sandes,  after- 
ward Bishop  of  Cashel,  who  from  his  well-deserved  popularity,  had  the  repre- 
sentation of  Dublin  University  in  his  hands,  was  canvassed  by  Plunket,  during 
his  contest  with  John  Wilson  Croker,  and  frankly  said  he  would  oppose  him, 
unless  he  could  clear  up  his  conduct  on  Emmett's  trial.  The  explanation  was 
satisfactory,  and  Sandes  supported  Plunket,  who  was  elected  by  a  majority  of 
jive.  On  the  other  hand,  the  eulogistic  biographer  in  the  Dublin  University 
Magazine,  while  he  acquits  Plunket  of  the  main  charge  of  ingratitude,  con- 
demns his  "  eager  zeal,"  and  adds  that  after  the  two  officers  of  the  Crown  did  not 
think  it  necessary  to  make  a  single  remark,  after  the  prisoner's  case  had  closed, 
Plunket  "  assailed  the  sad  enthusiast,  in  that  hour  of  his  deepest  suffering,  in 
a  theme  of  invective  which  might  have  been  well  spared."  The  fact  seems  to 
be,  Plunket,  who  had  begun  to  look  office-ward,  seized  the  opportunity  of 
showing  that  his  own  strong  and  hostile  opinions  had  softened  down  into  re- 
spect for  the  ruling  authorities,  and  for  good  order,  as  sustained  by  the  law. — M. 
*  Sir  Samuel  Romilly,  alike  distinguished  at  the  bar  and  in  Parliament,  was 
born  in  1757.  He  was  called  to  the  bar  in  1783,  and  soon  obtained  extensive 
Chancery  practice.  He  was  Solicitor-General  under  the  Grenville  ministry  in 
1806,  and  was  knighted.  In  Parliament  h  •  was  distinguished  for  his  attempts 
to  reform  the  criminal  law.  He  committed  suicide,  November  2,  1818.  One 
of  his  sons,  Sir  John  Romilly,  a  very  able  equity  lawyer,  is  now  Master  of  the 
Rolls  in  England.— M. 


104  WILLIAM  CONTNGHAM   PLUNKET. 

have  heard,  he  seemed  to  me  to  be  the  most  admirably  qualified 
for  the  department  of  his  profession  in  which  he  shines.  His 
mind  is  at  once  subtile  and  comprehensive  :  his  language  clear, 
copious,  and  condensed  :  his  powers  of  reasoning  are  altogether 
wonderful.  Give  /him  the  most  complicated  and  doubtful 
case  to  support  —  with  an  array  of  apparently  hostile  decisions 
to  oppose  him  at  every  step — the  previous  discussion  of  the 
question  has  probably  satisfied  you  that  the  arguments  of  his 
antagonists  are  neither  to  be  answered  nor  evaded  —  they 
have  fenced  round  the  rights  of  their  clients  with  all  the  great 
names  in  equity — Hardwicke,  Camden,  Thurlow,  Eldon  :*   Mr. 

*  Edward  Thurlow,  born  in  1735,  and  called  to  the  bar  in  1758,  was  made 
Solicitor-General  in  1770,  and  Attorney-General  in  1771.  In  Parliament,  he 
supported  the  ministers  in  their  anti-American  measures.  In  June,  1778,  he 
was  elevated  to  the  office  of  Lord-Chancellor,  and  was  created  Lord  Thurlow. 
In  1783,  he  quitted  office,  when  the  Coalition  Ministry  came  in,  but  was  reap- 
pointed on  Pitt's  becoming  Premier.  In  1793,  on  a  quarrel  with  Pitt,  he  again 
resigned,  went  into  private  life,  and  died  in  September,  1806.  He  was  a  good 
lawyer,  but  brusq?ie  in  his  manners.  —  Charles  Pratt  (afterward  Earl  of  Cam- 
den) was  the  son  of  Sir  John  Pratt,  Chief-Justice  of  the  King's  Bench  in  the 
time  of  George  L,  and  was  born  in  1714.  He  slowly  but  gradually  got  into 
business  at  the  bar.  In  1757,  he  was  appointed  Attorney-General,  at  the  in- 
stance of  the  elder  Pitt,  and  entered  Parliament.  In  1761,  he  was  made  Chief- 
Justice  of  the  Common  Pleas,  and  soon  showed  his  independence  by  deciding, 
in  the  case  of  Wilkes,  that  general  warrants  were  illegal.  In  1765,  the  Rock- 
ingham Ministry  called  him  to  the  Upper  House,  as  Lord  Camden.  As  a  peer, 
his  course  was  independent,  and  he  denied  the  right  of  Great  Britain,  as  claimed 
by  the  Government,  "  to  impose  laws  upon  the  American  colonies  in  all  cases 
whatsoever."  In  July,  1766,  Lord  Camden  was  made  Lord-Chancellor.  In 
1770,  opposing  his  colleagues  in  the  Ministry,  who  were  hurrying  the  crisis 
with  America,  Lord  Camden  quitted  office.  Here  ceased  his  judicial  career, 
but  he  was  a  political  combatant  for  twenty-four  years  longer  —  always  con 
demning  the  war  with  America,  always  defending  the  liberty  of  the  subject. 
In  1782,  he  entered  the  Rockingham  Ministry  as  President  of  the  Council, 
which,  with  a  slight  interval  under  the  Coalition  Ministry,  he  continued  to  hold 
until  his  death.  He  was  created  Earl  and  Viscount  in  1786,  and  died  in  April, 
1794,  aged  eighty.  He  was  one  of  the  greatest  constitutional  lawyers  England 
ever  possessed.  —  John  Scott,  afterward  Earl  of  Eldon,  was  born  in  1751.  His 
elder  brother,  afterward  Lord  Stowell,  was  born  six  years  earlier.  John  Scott 
was  educated  at  Oxford,  where  he  obtained  a  fellowship  in  1767,  which  he  for- 
feited in  1772  (celibacy  being  imposed  upon  the  fellows  of  English  colleges), 
■>y  running  off  and  marrying  the  daughter  of  a  rich  banker  at  Newcastle,  bis 
native  place.     Soon  after,  he  had  to  read  the  law  lectures  at  Oxford,  as  deputy 


RATIONALE    OF    HIS   PLEADING.  105 

Plunket  rises.  You  are  deeply  attentive,  rather  from  curios- 
ity to  witness  a  display  of  hopeless  dexterity,  than  from  any 
uncertainty  about  the  event.  He  commences  by  some  general 
undisputed  principle  of  law,  that  seems  perhaps,  at  the  first 
view,  not  to  bear  the  remotest  relation  to  the  matter  in  contro- 
versy ;  but  to  this  he  appends  another  and  another,  until  by  a 
regular  series  of  connected  propositions,  he  brings  it  down  to 
the  very  point  before  the  court ;  and  insists,  nay  demonstrates, 
that  the  court  can  not  decide  against  him  without  violating 
one  of  its  own  most  venerated  maxims.  Nothing  can  be  more 
masterly  than  the  manner  in  which  all  this  is  done.     There  is 

For  the  Vinerian  professor;  and,  ludicrously  enough,  the  first  lecture  was  on  the 
statute  4  and  5  Philip  and  Mary,  ch.  8  :  "Of  young  men  running  away  with  maid- 
ens." He  had  one  hundred  and  forty  students  as  auditors,  all  of  whom  giggled, 
as  well  they  might,  at  the  difference  between  the  professor's  theory  and  prac- 
tice. Called  to  the  bar  in  1776,  Scott  joined  the  Northern  Circuit,  for  some 
years  with  ill-success.  In  1780,  the  reversal  of  one  of  the  Master  of  the  Rolls' 
judgments,  by  Lord-Chancellor  Thurlow,  upon  Scott's  argument,  drew  him  into 
notice.'  Further  success,  before  a  committee  of  the  Cormnons,  on  an  election 
case,  which  lasted  fifteen  days  (with  a  retainer  of  fifty  guineas,  a  daily  fee 
often  guineas,  and  an  evening-consultation  fee  of  five  guineas),  gave  him  repu- 
tation, as  well  as  money  and  hope.  In  1783,  he  was  made  King's  Counsel, 
with  Erskine.  At  this  time  he  entered  Parliament,  where  he  and  Erskine 
made  their  maiden  speeches  in  the  same  debate,  but  on  opposite  sides  —  Scott 
opposing  and  Erskine  defending  Fox's  India  Bill.  In  1788,  he  was  made  So- 
licitor-General, and  knighted  —  and  Attorney-General  in  1793,  which  office  he 
retained  to  the  year  1799,  conducting  the  state  trials  of  Home  Tooke,  Hardy, 
and  Thelwall,  for  high-treason.  In  July,  1799^  he  became  Chief-Justice  of  the 
Common  Pleas,  and  was  created  Baron  Eldon.  He  was  then  making  between 
ten  and  twelve  thousand  pounds  sterling  a  year  by  his  practice  ;  but  if  the  salary 
of  a  Judge  was  much  less,  so  was  the  labor.  In  this  new  capacity,  he  proved 
himself  in  every  respect  equal  to  the  duties.  In  1801,  he  became  Lord-Chan 
cellor,  by  the  King's  own  request,  and  abandoned  the  Common  Pleas  with  re- 
gret. In  February,  1806,  when  the  Grenville  and  Fox  Cabinet  came  in,  Lord 
Eldon  quitted  office,  was  succeeded  by  Lord  Erskine,  and  returned  in  April, 
1807,  to  continue  until  1827,  when  Canning  became  Premier,  and  Sir  John 
Copley,  then  created  Lord  Lyndhurst,  received  the  Great  Seal.  In  1821,  Lord 
Eldon  was  made  Earl  and  Viscount.  As  a  Judge,  he  never  had  a  superior,  if 
he  had  an  equal,  in  Westminster  Hall.  His  fault  was  delay,  caused  by  hie 
doubling.  On  political  questions  he  had  no  delay,  but  was  ready,  intolerant, 
and  unscrupulous.     He  accumulated   immense   wealth,  and  died  in   January, 

1838.  — M. 

A* 


10$  WILLTAM   CONYNGHAM    PLtJNKET. 

no  ostentation  of  ingenuity  and  research.  Everything  is  clear, 
simple,  and  familiar  :  you  assent  without  a  struggle  to  each 
separate  conclusion.  It  is  only  when  you  are  brought  to  the 
ultimate  result,  that  you  startle  at  discovering  the  consummate 
skill  of  the  logician,  who,  by  wily  and  imperceptible  ap- 
proaches, has  gained  a  vantage-point  from  which  he  can 
descend  upon  his  adversaries,  and  compel  them  to  abandon  a 
position  that  was  deemed  impregnable. 

But  Lords  Hardwicke,  Thurlow,  Camden,  Eldon,  &c,  are 
said  to  be  against  him.  The  advocate  accordingly  proceeds 
to  examine  each  of  these  authorities  in  detail;  he  analyses 
their  language;  by  distinctions  that  seem  natural  and  obvious, 
but  which  in  reality  are  most  subtile,  he  shows  how  capable  it 
is  of  various  interpretations  ;  he  confronts  the  construction 
contended  for  by  conflicting  decisions  of  the  same  judges  on 
other  and  similar  occasions;  he  points  out  unsuspected  anom- 
alies that  would  arise  from  adopting  the  interpretation  of  his 
adversaries,  and  equally  unsuspected  accordances  with  general 
principles,  that  Avould  follow  his  own.  He  thus  goes  on  until, 
by  reiterated  processes  of  matchless  sagacity,  he  has  either 
neutralized  or  brought  over  to  support  himself,  all  the  author- 
ities upon  which  his  opponents  most  firmly  relied  ;  and  he  sits 
down,  leaving  the  court,  if  not  a  convert  to  his  opinion,  at 
least  grievously  perplexed  to  detect  and  explain  the  fallacies 
upon  which  it  rests. 

Mr.  Plunket  is  not  said  to  be  a  profound  lawyer  ;  he  cites 
fewer  cases  than  any  other  counsel  at  the  Irish  bar;  and  on 
common  occasions,  frequently  contents  himself  with  merely 
commenting  upon  those  adduced  against  him.  His  supremacy 
is  altogether  intellectual.  He  leaves  to  others  the  technical 
drudgery  of  wading  through  tomes  and  indexes  in  search  of 
legal  saws  and  "  modern  instances."  The  moment  a  question 
is  submitted  to  him,  his  mind  intuitively  applies  all  the  great 
principles  that  are  favorable  or  hostile  :  these  he  has  firmly 
fixed,  and  scientifically  arranged  in  his  memory,  and  so  far 
may  be  said  to  be  never  unprepared.  For  the  rest  he  depends 
upon  the  resources  of  a  talent  that  never  fails  him  —  upon  his 
resistless  vigor,  where  he  is  right  and  sincere  —  upon  his  formi- 


HIS    RHETORIC.  10? 

dable  ingenuity  and  sophistry,  where  he  can  not  venture  to  be 
candid — upon  his  extemporaneous  power  of  going  through  the 
most  intricate  processes  of  thought  with  all  the  ease  and  famil- 
iarity of  ordinary  discourse ;  and  most  of  all,  upon  a  rapid 
apprehension,  which  grasps  and  secures  the  entire  of  any  prop- 
osition of  which  a  single  particle  may  chance  to  flit  across 
his  mind  —  a  perfection  of  faculty  that  enables  him  to  draw 
the  most  unexpected  conclusions  from  the  topics  adduced 
against  him,  and  thus  to  render  all  the  industry  of  his  antag- 
onists subservient  to  his  own  occasions. 

This,  though  an  imperfect  sketch,  will  convey  some  general 
ideas  of  this  eminent  advocate  ;  but  there  is  one  peculiarity 
in  his  powers,  which  to  be  adequately  comprehended  must  be 
actually  witnessed.  I  allude  to  his  capacity  (in  which  he  ex- 
ceeds every  public  speaker  I  ever  heard)  of  pouring  out,  I  would 
almost  say  indefinitely,  a  continuous,  unintermitted  volume 
of  thought  and  language.  In  this  respect,  I  look  upon  Mr. 
Plunket's  going  through  a  long  and  important  argument  in  the 
Court  of  Chancery  to  be  a  most  extraordinary  exhibition  of 
human  intellect.  For  hours  he  will  go  on  and  on,  with  un- 
wearied rapidity,  arguing,  defining,  illustrating,  separating  in- 
tricate facts,  laying  down  subtile  distinctions,  prostrating  an 
objection  here,  pouncing  upon  a  fallacy  there,  then  retracing 
his  steps,  and  restating  in  some  original  point  of  view  his  gen- 
eral proposition;  then  flying  off  again  to  the  outskirts  of  the 
question,  and  dealing  his  desultory  blows  with  merciless  reit- 
eration wherever  an  inch  of  ground  remains  to  be  cleared  ;  and 
during  the  whole  of  this,  not  only  does  not  his  vigor  flag  for  a 
single  instant,  but  his  mind  does  not  even  pause  for  a  second 
for  a  topic,  an  idea,  or  an  expression.  This  velocity  of  crea- 
tion, arrangement,  and  delivery,  is  quite  astonishing;  and  what 
adds  to  your  wonder  is,  that  it  appears  to  be  achieved  without 
an  effort.  Mass  after  mass  of  argument  is  thrown  off,  convey- 
ed in  phraseology  vigorous,  appropriate,  and  succinct,  while 
the  speaker,  as  if  the  mere  minister  and  organ  of  some  hidden 
power,  that  saves  him  the  cost  of  laborious  exertion,  appears 
solely  anxious  to  impress  upon  others  his  own  reliance  upon 
the  force  of  what  seems  to  come  unsought. 


108  WILLIAM    CONYNGHAM    PLUNKET. 

This  singular  command  over  his  great  powers,  coupled  with 
his  imposing  exterior  and  masculine  intonations,  gives  extra- 
ordinary weight  to  all  he  says.  From  his  unsuspected  earnest- 
ness of  tone  and  manner,  you  would  often  imagine  that  his 
zeal  for  his  client  was  only  secondary  to  a  deeper  anxiety 
that  the  court  should  not  violate  the  uniformity  of  its  decisions 
by  establishing  a  precedent  fraught  with  anomaly  and  danger, 
while  the  authoritative  ease  and  perspicuity  with  which  he 
states  and  illustrates  his  opinions  gives  him  the  air,  as  it  were, 
of  some  high  legal  functionary  appearing  on  behalf  of  the  pub- 
lic, not  so  much  to  debate  the  question  before  the  court  as  to 
testify  to  the  law  that  should  decide  it.  So  that  in  respect  to 
this  quality  of  apparent  conviction  and  good  faith,  we  may 
well  apply  to  Mr.  Plunket  the  words  of  Cicero  in  commenda- 
tion of  one  of  the  ancient  orators  of  Rome ;  nor  will  the  illus- 
tration be  found  to  fail  from  any  want  of  coincidence  in  the 
personal  characters  of  the  two  men  :  "  In  Scauri  oratione,  sa- 
pientis  hominis  et  recti,  gravitas  samma  et  naturalis  qucedam 
inerat  auctoritas,  non  et  causam,  sed  ut  testimonium  dicere  pu- 
taresy* 

But  although  Mr.  Plunket  is  thus  skilful  in  giving  plausibil- 
ity to  reasonings  that  do  not  satisfy  himself,  I  think  it  just 
to  add  (what  I  have  heard  asserted)  that  even  his  own  fine 
understanding  is  often  the  dupe  of  his  other  faculties,  and  that, 
in  the  hurry  and  fervor  of  argumentation,  his  judgment,  with 
all  its  vigilance,  can  not  escape  the  snares  his  ingenuity  has 
weaved  for  others.  I  have  even  fancied  at  times  (when  in  the 
course  of  a  cause  some  unexpected  point  of  law  is  started)  that 
I  have  observed  his  argumentative  devices  in  the  very  act  of 
imposing  themselves  upon  his  mind  as  irrefutable  conclusions. 
He  rises  to  make,  perhaps,  a  single  observation,  and  is  about 
to  resume  his  place,  when  a  new  topic  in  support  of  his  argu- 
ment flashes  across  his  mind.  As  he  proceeds  to  state  it,  fresh 
principles  and  illustrations  crowd  in  to  defend  him  in  his  posi- 

*  "  The  speeches  of  Scaurus,  who  was  a  wise  and  virtuous  man,  were  distin 
guished  hy  the  utmost  dignity,  and  by  a  certain  natural  imposing  authority 
which  led  his  audience  to  suppose  that  he  appeared  less  in  the  character  of  an 
advocate  than  of  a  witness." 


INDECISION    OF    JUDGMENT.  109 

tion  :  an  incidental  remark  is  thus  expanded  into  an  elaborate 
piece  of  reasoning,  during  the  progress  of  which  he  gradually 
becomes  more  confident  and  earnest,  until,  from  the  intense 
ardor  with  which  he  follows  up  each  successive  advantage,  he 
finally  works  himself  into  a  conviction  that  all  the  merits  of 
the  question  are  on  his  side. 

But  it  is  only  when  he  is  the  retained  advocate  of  a  particu- 
lar party,  whose  claims  he  has  to  sustain  in  open  court,  that 
Mr.  Plunket  is  subject  to  this  species  of  mental  deception.  In 
the  cold  and  cautious  meditation  of  the  closet,  when  he  has  to 
pronounce  upon  a  disputable  case  submitted  for  his  opinion, 
the  predominance  of  his  argumentative  powers  operates  upon 
his  judgment  in  quite  another  way.  Instead  of  rushing  to 
hasty  conclusions,  he  finds  a  difficulty  in  coming  to  any  con- 
clusion at  all.  The  very  perfection  of  some  of  his  faculties,  his 
sagacity,  his  subtilty,  and  his  intuitive  perception  of  the  re- 
motest consequences  of  any  given  premise,  which  render  him 
so  powerful  as  an  advocate,  have  in  this  case  only  the  effect 
of  encumbering  him  with  equal  arguments  and  equal  difficul- 
ties on  either  side,  and  thus  of  keeping  his  mind  in  a  state  of 
logical  suspense.  This  fact  is  well  known,  and  the  conse- 
quence (I  speak  from  general  report.)  is,  that  in  this  department 
of  his  profession  his  practice  is  utterly  disproportioned  to  his 
great  experience  and  his  unrivalled  estimation. 

The  effect  of  Mr.  Plunket's  powers  is  greatly  aided  by  his 
external  appearance.*     His  frame  is  tall,  robust,  and  compact. 

*  Charles  Phillips  has  thus  sketched  Plunket  in  his  prime :  "  Who  is  that 
square-built,  solitary,  ascetic-looking-  person,  pacing  to  and  fro,  his  hands  crossed 
behind  his  back,  so  apparently  absorbed  in  self — the  observer  of  all,  yet  tlie 
companion  of  none  1  It  is  easy  to  designate  the  man,  but  difficult  adequately 
to  delineate  the  character.  Perhaps  never  was  a  person  to  be  estimated  less  by 
appearances  ;  he  is  precisely  the  reverse  of  what  he  feels  ;  externally  cold,  yet 
ardent  in  his  nature;  in  manner  repulsive,  yet  warm,  sincere,  and  steadfast  in  his 
friendships  ;  severe  in  aspect,  yet  in  reality  social  and  companionable  —  that  is 
Plunket  —  a  man  of  the  foremost  rank,  a  wit,  a  jurist,  a  statesman,  an  orator,  a 
logician  —  the  Irish  Gysippus!  as  Outran  called  him!  in  whom  are  concentrated 
all  the  energies  and  all  the  talents  of  the  country.  Eminent  at  the  bar,  it  is  in 
Parliament  we  see  his  faculties  in  their  fullest  development.  Yet,  in  the  Irish 
House  of  Commons,  his  chief  displays  were  on  a  single  question  —  that  of  the 
Union ;  and  in  the  British  Parliament — that  of  the  Roman  Catholic  question." — M. 


110  WILLIAM    CONYNGHAM    PLUNKET. 

His  face  is  one  of  the  most  striking  I  ever  saw;  and  ye\  the 
peculiarity  lies  so  much  more  in  the  expression  than  the  out- 
line, that  I  find  it  not  easy  to  describe  it.  The  features  on 
the  whole  are  blunt  and  harsh.  There  is  extraordinary  breadth 
and  capacity  of  forehead  ;  and  when  the  brows  are  raised  in 
the  act  of  thought,  it  becomes  intersected  with  an  infinite  series 
of  parallel  lines  and  folds.  Neither  the  eyes  nor  brows  are 
particularly  expressive;  nor  indeed  can  I  say  that  any  of  the 
other  features  would  singly  indicate  the  character  of  the  man, 
if  I  except  a  peculiar  mnscular  largeness  and  rigidity  about 
the  mouth  and  lips,  from  which  you  may  collect,  that  smiling 
has  "never  been  their  occupation." 

The  general  character  of  Mr.  Plunket's  countenance  is  deep 
seriousness  —  an  expression  that  becomes  more  strongly  mark- 
ed from  the  unvarying  pallor  that  overspreads  his  features. 
It  is  literally  "  the  pale  cast  of  thought."  Some  have  accused 
his  physiognomy  as  being  unsocial  and  austere.  To  me  it  ap- 
peared that  the  signs  of  those  qualities  have  been  confounded 
with  the  natural  and  now  indelible  traces  of  a  grave  and  vig- 
orous intellect,  habitually  absorbed  in  masculine  investigations, 
and  preferring  to  dwell  in  the  midst  of  its  own  thoughts.  Nor 
do  I  find  anything  repelling  in  the  circumstance  that  his  fea- 
tures seldom  descend  for  a  moment  from  their  dignity.  Know- 
ing what  his  mind  and  his  history  have  been,  I  am  prepared 
for  what  I  meet.  I  find  no  flashes  of  sensibility,  no  play  of 
shifting  or  conflicting  emotions,  but  a  calm  constitutional  sever- 
ity of  aspect,  importing  a  mind  conscious  of  its  powers,  and 
vigilantly  keeping  them  in  unremitted  discipline  against  the 
daily  task  that  awaits  them.* 

*  Phillips  truly  says,  that  Plunket's  "  style  was  peculiar,  and  almost  quite 
divested  of  the  characteristics  generally  to  be  found  in  that  of  his  countrymen. 
Strong,  cogent  reasoning  —  plain  but  deep  sense  —  earnest  feeling  and  imagery, 
seldom  introduced  except  to  press  the  reasoning  or  to  illustrate  it,  were  the 
distinguishing  features  of  his  eloquence :  he  by  no  means  rejected  ornament, 
but  he  used  it  severely  and  sparingly;  and  though  it  produced  the  effect,  it  was 
not  directly,  but  rather  collaterally  and  incidentally.  He  always  seemed  to 
speak  for  a  purpose,  never  for  mere  display ;  and  his  wit,  like  his  splendor,  ap- 
peared to  be  struck  out  by  the  collision  of  the  moment.  In  this,  indeed,  his 
art  was  superlative.     There  were  passages  which  could  not  have  been  flung  off 


HIS    MANNER.  Ill 

I  expected  to  Lave  found  a  tinge  of  melancholy  in  Mr.  Plun- 
ket's  features  —  such  as  I  had  observed  in  Grattan  and  some 
other  eminent  Irishmen,  who  had  attended  the  Parliament  of 
their  country  in  its  last  moments,  and  who  could  find  nothing 
in  after-life  to  console  them  for  the  loss.  I  often  heard  Mr, 
Grattan  speak  upon  that  event.  I  never  found  him  more 
eloquent  or  interesting  than  when,  in  a  circle  of  his  private 
friends,  he  poured  out  his  indignation  against  a  measure  that 
had  baffled  all  his  hopes,  and  his  unavailing  regret  that  he 
had  been  too  confiding  at  a  conjuncture  when  it  was  possible 
to  have  averted  the  disaster.  But  I  could  discern  no  traces 
of  similar  sentiments  in  Mr.  Plunket's  looks.  He  was,  how- 
ever, a  much  younger  man,  and  could  form  new  views  and 
attachments  ;  nor  is  it,  perhaps,  surprising,  that  at  this  distance 
of  time  he  should  not  revert  with  sadness  to  an  event,  which 
in  its  consequences  has  opened  to  him  so  much  larger  a  field 
for  the  exhibition  of  his  powers. 

Mr.  Plunket's  manner  is  not  rhetorical  —  it  is  (what  I  con- 
sider much  better)  vigorous,  natural,  and  earnest.  He  has  no 
variety  of  gesture,  and  what  he  uses  seems  perfectly  unstudied. 
He  is  evidently  so  thoroughly  absorbed  in  his  subject,  as  to  be 
quite  unconscious  that  he  has  hands  and  arms  to  manage.  He 
has  a  habit,  when  he  warms,  as  he  always  and  quickly  does, 
of  firmly  closing  both  hands,  raising  them  slowly  and  simul- 
taneously above  his  head,  and  then  suddenly  striking  them 
down  with  extraordinary  force.     The  action  is  altogether  un- 

extempore,  and  must  have  been  the  result  of  very  elaborate  preparation."  — 
Many  of  his  isolated  passages  are  beautiful.  In  a  parliamentary  speech  on  the 
Catholic  Claims,  in  1821,  speaking  of  the  great  departed  who  had  joined  in 
discussions,  he  said,  "  Walking  before  the  sacred  images  of  the  illustrious  dead, 
as  in  a  public  and  solemn  procession,  shall  we  not  dismiss  all  party  feeling,  all 
angry  passions,  all  unworthy  prejudices?  I  will  not  talk  of  past  disputes;  1 
will  not  mingle  in  this  act  of  national  justice  anything  that  can  awaken  per- 
sonal animosity."  It  was  the  speech  of  which  this  is  an  atom  which  actually 
converted  nine  hostile  votes  on  the  Catholic  Question,  in  the  British  House  of 
Commons.  The  late  Sir  James  Macintosh,  who  had  heard  all  the  great  ora- 
tors—  from  Pitt,  Sheridan,  Burke,  and  Fox,  to  Brougham,  Canning,  Sheil,  and 
Macaulay  —  repeatedly  said,  that  if  Plunket  had  been  regularly  trained  to  a 
.  British  House  of  Commons,  he  would  have  been  the  greatest  speaker  ther? 
that  he  ever  remembered. —  M 


112  WILLIAM    CONYNGHAM    PLUNKET. 

graceful:  but  its  strength,  and  I  would  even  add,  its  appro- 
priateness to  the  man  and  to  his  stern  simplicity  of  character 
and  style,  atone  for  its  inelegance.  Besides,  this  very  disdain 
of  the  externals  of  oratory  has  something  imposing  in  it :  you 
are  made  to  feel  that  you  are  in  the  presence  of  a  powerful 
mind  that  looks  to  itself  alone,  and  you  surrender  yourself 
more  completely  to  its  guidance  from  the  conviction  that  no 
hackneyed  artifice  has  been  employed  to  allure  your  confi- 
dence. 

Mr.  Plunket's  delivery,  as  already  mentioned,  is  uncommonly 
rapid,  but  his  articulation  is  at  the  same  time  so  distinct  that  I 
seldom  lose  a  word.  In  calm  discussion  his  intonations  are 
deep,  sonorous,  and  dignified  :  when  he  becomes  animated,  his 
voice  assumes  a  higher  pitch,  and  the  tones,  though  always 
natural  and  impressive,  are  occasionally  shrill.  His  extem- 
poraneous powers  of  expression  are  not  to  be  described  by  the 
common  term,  fluency.  It  is  not  merely  over  words  and 
phrases,  but  over  every  possible  variety  of  construction,  that 
he  appears  to  hold  an  absolute  command  —  the  consciousness 
of  this  power  often  involves  him  in  grammatical  difficulties. 
He  allows  a  thought  to  drift  along  into  the  midst  of  obstruc- 
tions, from  which  no  outlet  can  be  descried,  as  if  for  the  mere- 
purpose  of  surprising  you  by  his  adroitness  when  he  discovers 
the  danger,  steering  it  in  safety  through  all  the  straits  and 
intricacies  of  speech  —  or  by  the  boldness  with  which  he  forces 
a  passage  if  he  can  not  find  one.  But  it  is  only  over  argumen- 
tative diction  that  he  has  acquired  this  mastery  :  when  he 
calls  in  the  aid  of  sentiment  and  passion  to  enforce  his  logic, 
his  phraseology  labors,  and,  if  the  passage  be  unpremeditated, 
frequently  falls  short  of  the  strength  and  dignity  of  the  con- 
ception. But  his  deficiency  in  this  respect  evidently  proceeds 
from  want  of  practice,  not  of  capacity  ;  nor  does  the  exertion 
that  it  costs  him  to  supply  appropriate  language  ever  restrain 
him  from  illustrating  a  legal  argument  by  any  bold  practical 
figure  that  may  cross  his  mind.* 

*  I  shall  cite  a  single  example  :  it  will  also  serve  as  a  specimen  of  the  prone- 
ness  to  imagery  that  prevails  in  the  Irish  courts.  The  question  turned  upon 
the  right  of  presentation  to  a  living,     Mr.  P.'s  clients  and  their  predecessor* 


HIS    PARLIAMENTARY    CAREER.  113 

Mr.  Plunket  is  a  memorable,  and  I  believe,  a  solitary  in- 
stance of  an  eminent  barrister  whose  general  reputation  has 
been  increased  by  his  parliamentary  efforts.*     His  speeches 

had  been  in  undisturbed  enjoyment  of  the  right  for  two  centuries ;  the  opposite 
party  called  upon  them  to  show  their  original  title.  Mr.  P.  insisted  upon  the 
legal  presumption,  arising  from  this  long  possession,  that  the  title  had  been 
originally  a  good  one,  though  the  deeds  that  had  created  it  had  been  lost,  and 
consequently  could  not  be  produced.  In  commenting  upon  the  necessity  and 
wisdom  of  such  a  rule  of  law,  without  which  few  properties  of  ancient  standing 
could  be  secure,  he  observed  —  "Time  is  the  great  destroyer  of  evidence,  but 
he  is  also  the  great  protector  of  titles.  If  he  comes  with  a  scythe  in  one  hand 
to  mow  down  the  muniments  of  our  possessions,  he  holds  an  hour-glass  in  the 
other,  from  which  he  incessantly  metes  out  the  portions  of  duration  that  are  to 
render  those  muniments  no  longer  necessary."  [Lord  Brougham,  who  intro- 
duced this  extract  into  his  sketch  of  Grattan,  eulogized  it  highly.  In  the  equity 
case,  which  drew  forth  the  speech  in  which  it  sparkled,  Plunket  was  retained 
by  Trinity  College,  which  sought  to  recover  the  right  of  presentation  to  the 
living  of  Clonee.  Mr  Johnston,  called  "  Bitter  Bob,"  was  his  opponent,  with 
a  bad  case  and  large  fee.  After  Johnston  had  been  voluble  for  some  time, 
Plunket,  assuming  a  ludicrous  expression  of  surprise,  questioned  the  relevancy 
of  what  he  said,  and  asked  "  Does  the  learned  gentleman  mean  to  rely  upon 
prescription  or  upon  law  ?"  Taken  by  surprise  and  conscious  that  he  could  not 
rest  upon  prescription,  Johnston  hastily  answered  "  Oh !  most  certainly  upon 
law."  Plunket  immediately  asked,  with  mock  gravity,  "  Well,  then,  where  is 
your  law  ?"  Utterly  confounded  by  the  directness  and  suddenness  of  the  ques- 
tion, Johnston  faltered  out  "  I  don't  know,"  and  sat  down,  half  crying.  It  was 
a  confession  at  once  true  and  candid.  —  M.] 

*  There  were  many  predictions  of  Plunket's  failure  in  the  Imperial  Parlia- 
ment. What  Grattan  had  said  of  Flood,  that  an  oak  of  the  forest  was  too  old 
to  be  transplanted  at  fifty,  was  quoted  against  him  —  though  he  was  no  more 
than  six-and-thirty  when  the  Union  took  place.  Plunket,  in  the  British,  was 
not  the  fervid  orator  he  had  been  in  the  Irish  Parliament.  He  knew  that  he 
had  a  different  audience,  and  accommodated  himself  to  it.  He  imitated  no 
speaker  there — he  could  not  be  compared  with  any.  His  first  speech  in  1807, 
on  the  Catholic  question,  was  a  fine  specimen  of  solid  reasoning  and  rich  elo- 
quence, and  of  logical  argument  and  historical  facts.  It  placed  Plunket  in  the 
foremost  rank  of  modern  orators.  From  that  time  until  he  returned  to  Parlia- 
ment six  years  after,  he  confined  himself  to  his  profession.  His  own  Univei 
eity,  justly  proud  of  him,  sent  him  back  to  Parliament;  and  in  1813,  as 
well  as  again  in  1814,  Plunket  spoke  on  the  Catholic  piestion,  and  only  on  that 
subject.  One  of  his  incidental  sarcasms,  in  1814,  \va$  polished  and  keen.  Ad- 
dressing the  Speaker  (Abbott),  who  had,  ex-officio,  to  return  the  thanks  of  the 
House  to  Wellington,  he  said,  "  But  you,  sir,  while  you  were  binding  the 
wreath  round  the  brow  of  the  conqueror,  assured  him  that  his  victorious  follow- 
er must  never  expect  to  participate  in  the  fruits  of  their  valor,  but  thai  thej 


114  WILLIAM   CONYNGHAM   PLUNKET. 

ou  the  Union,  in  the  Irish  House  of  Commons,  raised  him  a* 
once  to  the  first  class  of  parliamentary  orators.  When  lie  was 
returned  by  the  University  of  Dublin  (in  1812)  to  the  imperial 
senate,  Curran  publicly  predicted  that  his  talents  would  create 
a  similar  sensation  here :  I  need  not  add  how  completely  the 
prophecy  has  been  fulfilled.  It  would  lead  me  too  far  to  enter 
into  a  minute  examination  of  Mr.  Plunket's  parliamentary  style 
and  manner;  in  many  points  I  should  have  to  repeat  some  of 
the  foregoing  remarks.  I  can  not,  however,  forbear  to  observe, 
that  his  language  and  views  in  the  House  of  Commons  discover 
a  mind  that  has  thoroughly  escaped  the  noxious  influence  of 
his  professional  habits.  He  has  shown  that  it  is  possible  for 
the  same  person  to  be  a  most  subtle  and  dexterous  disputant 
upon  a  technical  subject,  and  a  statesman-like  reasoner  upon 
a  comprehensive  one. 

With  regard  to  his  political  tenets — his  opposition  to  the 
Union,  his  connection  with  the  Whig  administration  of  1806, 
and  his  subsequent  exertions  in  favor  of  Catholic  Emancipa- 
tion, seem  to  have  placed  him  on  the  list  of  Irish  patriots ;  but 
his  support  of  popular  privileges,  where  he  has  supported  them, 
appears  to  be  entirely  unconnected  with  popular  sympathies  — 
his  patriotism  is  a  conclusion,  not  a  passion.  In  all  questions 
between  the  people  and  the  state,  it  is  easy  to  perceive  that  he 
identifies  himself  with  the  latter;  he  never,  like  Fox  and 
Grattan,*  flings  himself  in  imagination,  into  the  popular  ranks, 

who  had  shed  their  blood  in  achieving  the  conquest  were  the  only  persons  who 
were  never  to  share  the  profits  of  success  in  the  rights  of  citizens."  This  ap- 
pears to  be  the  germ  of  Shell's  striking  and  brilliant  address  to  Lord  Hardinge, 
with  reference  to  the  aid  given  in  the  field  by  Irish  Catholics.  —  M. 

*  Henry  Grattan,  the  most  eminent  Irishman  of  his  time,  was  born  in  1746, 
in  Dublin.  Educated  in  Dublin  University,  he  became  a  law-student  of  the 
Middle  Temple  in  1767,  was  called  to  the  bar  in  1772,  and  became  member 
for  Charlemont  in  1775,  for  which  town  he  sat  until  1790,  when  he  was  elected 
by  the  citizens  of  Dublin.  In  1797,  he  did  not  again  become  a  candidate.  In 
1800,  he  was  returned  for  Wicklow,  to  oppose  the  Union.  From  1805  he  was 
a  member  of  the  Imperial  Parliament,  and  was  the  earnest  and  able  chanpion 
of  the  Catholics,  to  his  dying  day.  He  found  his  country  a  province  —  he  made 
it  a  nation  ;  he  found  it  the  prey  of  a  rapacious  oligarchy — he  raised  it  to  inde- 
pendence ;  to  use  his  own  striking  words,  "  he  sat  by  its  cradle,  he  followed  its 
fcearse."     Grattan  was  the  life  and  soul  of  the  struggle  for  Irish  independence, 


HENRY    GRATTAN.  115 

to  march  at  their  head,  and  in  their  name,  and  as  one  of  them^ 
to  demand  a  recognition  of  their  rights.     Mr.  Plimket  has  not 

1782.  His  eloquence  was  great,  in  a  country  where  every  man  can  freely  and 
suitably  express  himself  in  public.  His  courage  was  indomitable,  and,  in  truth, 
his  sarcasm  needed  such  support.  The  people,  grateful,  gladly  confirmed  the 
grant  of  fifty  thousand  pounds  sterling  made  to  him  by  the  Parliament :  he  had 
refused  the  proposed  sum  of  one  hundred  thousand  pounds.  With  this  he 
bought  Tinnahinch,  in  the  county  of  Wicklow,  where  he  lived,  as  Moore  said  — 
"  'Mid  the  trees  which  a  nation  had  given,  and  which  bowed 
As  if  each  brought  a  new  civic  crown  for  his  head." 
His  last  efforts  in  the  Irish  Parliament  were  against  the  Union.  In  the  British 
House  of  Commons,  in  1804,  Fox  placed  him  on  the  seat  next  his  own  ;  and  his 
first  speech,  in  favor  of  Fox's  motion  on  the  Catholic  question,  and  in  reply  to 
Eh.  Duigenan,  who  had  imported  his  intolerance  to  London,  was  answered  by 
Spencer  Percival,  the  Minister,  who  greatly  complimented  its  brilliancy.  In 
England,  Grattan  was  more  subdued  than  in  his  own  land  in  former  years,  and 
Curran  smartly  said  that  "  indeed  he  had  brought  his  club  into  the  English 
House  of  Commons,  but  took  care,  beforehand,  to  pare  off  its  knobs."  He 
advocated  the  CaLholic  claims,  by  appointment,  until  1815,  when  Sir  Henry 
Parnell  was  intrusted  with  the  conduct  of  the  measure.  His  popularity  had  so 
much  faded,  that  he  was  assailed,  at  the  general  election  in  1818,  by  a  mob  in 
Dublin,  and  narrowly  escaped  with  life.  In  1819,  his  motion  for  a  committee 
on  the  Catholic  claims  was  lost  by  a  majority  of  only  two.  In  June,  1820,  he 
hurried  over,  weak  in  health,  and  worn  by  seventy-four  years,  to  present  the 
Catholic  petition  once  more  —  but  died  before  he  could  do  it.  His  remains 
found  interment  in  Westminster  Abbey,  next  to  those  of  Mr.  Fox.  His  person 
was  short  and  clumsy,  with  disproportionably  long  arms ;  his  voice  shrill  and 
badly  managed;  his  manner  artificial,  his  action  vehement  and  unnatural  —  but 
his  diction,  or  wardrobe  of  words,  was  rich  in  the  extreme ;  his  language  full 
of  epigram  and  antithesis;  his  sentences  harmonious  and  forcible;  his  powers 
of  attack  and  defence  never  equalled.  The  brilliant  character  of  Grattan's  ora 
tory  was  thus  indicated  by  Moore,  in  one  of  his  Irish  Melodies:  — 

"  Who,  that  ever  hath  heard  him  —  hath  drunk  at  the  source 
Of  that  wonderful  eloquence,  all  Erin's  own, 
In  whose  high-thoughted  daring,  the  fire  and  the  force, 
And  the  yet  untamed  spring  of  her  sphit,  are  shown  ? 
"  An  eloquence  rich,  wheresoever  its  wave 

Wandered  free  and  triumphant,  with  thoughts  that  shone  through, 
As  clear  as  the  brook's  '  stone  of  lustre,'  and  gave, 
With  the  flash  of  the  gem,  its  solidity  too." 

Grattan  was  a  politician,  but  not  a  statesman.  Yet,  from  1775  until  180U, 
the  history  of  Grattan  is  the  history  of  Ireland.  His  son  has  published  an  ex- 
cellent Memoir  of  him,  and  had  previously  edited  his  speeches.  Undoubteilly 
Grattan  was  a  remarkable  man  —  one  of  the  master-spirits  of  his  age. — Mt 


116  WILLIAM    CONYNGHAM    PLUNKET. 

temperament  for  tills.  He  studiously  keeps  aloof  from  the 
multitude,  and  even  when  their  strenuous  advocate,  lets  it  be 
seen  that  he  thinks  for  them,  not  with  them  —  he  never  warms 
into  "  the  man  of  the  people."  His  most  animated  appeals  in 
their  behalf  retain  the  tone  of  a  just  and  enlightened  aristocrat, 
gravely  and  earnestly  remonstrating  with  the  members  of  his 
own  body,  upon  the  danger  and  inexpediency  of  holding  out 
against  the  immutable  and  unconquerable  instincts  of  human 
nature. 

The  only  exception  that  I  recollect  to  these  remarks,  occurs 
in  his  speeches  against  the  Union.  There  he  boldly  plunged 
into  first  principles  ;  as,  among  other  instances,  when  he  ex- 
claimed, "I,  in  the  most  express  terms,  deny  the  competency 
of  Parliament  to  do  this  act  —  I  warn  you,  do  not  dare  to  lay 
your  hand  on  the  Constitution.  I  tell  you  that  if,  circum- 
stanced as  you  are,  you  pass  this  act.  it  will  be  a  nullity,  and 
that  no  man  in  Ireland  will  be  bound  to  obey  it.  I  make  the 
assertion  deliberately  —  I  repeat  it  —  and  I  call  on  any  man 
who  hears  me  to  take  down  my  words  :  you  have  not  been 
elected  for  this  purpose  —  you  are  appointed  to  make  laws,  and 
not  legislatures.  You  are  appointed  to  act  under  the  consti- 
tution, not  to  alter  it ;  to  exercise  the  functions  of  legislators, 
and  not  to  transfer  them :  and  if  you  do  so,  your  act  is  a 
dissolution  of  the  government ;  you  resolve  society  into  its 
original  elements,  and  no  man  in  the  land  is  bound  to  obey 
you."  Yet  even  here,  and  in  some  bolder  declarations  on  the 
same  occasion,  I  am  inclined  to  suspect  that  Mr.  Plunk et 
assumed  this  indignant  tone,  rather  as  a  member  of  the  assem- 
bly whose  independence  was  assailed,  than  from  any  impas- 
sioned sympathy  with  the  general  rights  of  the  body  that  he 
represented.  Had  the  question  been  a  popular  reform,  in- 
stead of  the  extinction  of  the  Irish  parliament,  he  would,  in 
all  likelihood,  have  been  equally  vehement  in  resisting  the 
innovation. 

Mr.  Plunket's  general  reading  is  said  to  be  limited  ;  and 
if  we  may  judge  from  the  rareness  of  his  allusions  to  the  great 
writers  of  ancient  and  modern  times,  the  opinion  is  not  un- 
founded.    When  he  was  about  to  appear  in  the  British  parlia- 


COMPARED    WITH    ROMILLY.  117 

tnent  in  1812,  it  was  wliispered  among  his  friends,  that  he 
prepared  himself  with  information  on  the  general  state  of 
European  politics  from  the  most  ordinary  sources:  he  wanted 
facts,  and  he  took  the  shortest  and  easiest  method  of  collecting 
them.  I  have  understood  that,  up  to  a  recent  period,  he  fre- 
quently employed  his  leisure  hours  upon  some  elementary 
treatise  of  pure  mathematics.  If  the  fact  be  so,  it  affords  a 
striking  proof  of  the  vigor  of  a  mind  which  could  find  a  relax- 
ation in  such  a  pursuit.* 

I  have  already  glanced  at  a  resemblance  between  Mr.  Plun- 
ket  and  the  late  Sir  Samuel  Romilly.  If  I  were  to  pursue  the 
comparison  into  the  private  characters  of  the  two  men,  the 
points  of  similarity  would  multiply,  and  in  no  particular  more 
strikingly  than  in  the  softness  and  intensity  of  their  domestic 
affections.  But  this  is  sacred  ground  :  yet  I  can  not  forbear 
to  mention  that  it  fell  to  my  lot  (when  last  in  Ireland),  sitting 
as  a  public  auditor  in  the  gallery  of  the  Court  of  Chancery, 
to  witness  a  burst  of  sensibility,  which,  coming  from  such  a 
man  as  Mr.  Plunket,  and  in  such  a  place,  sent  an  electric  thrill 
of  sympathy  and  respect  through  the  breasts  of  the  audience. 
An  aged  lady,  on  the  day  after  her  husband's  death,  had 
signed   a  paper,  resigning  her  right  to  a  portion  of  property 

*  Although  Phmket,  as  his  aspect  showed,  was  of  a  saturnine  temperament, 
he  was  not  above  enjoying  and  even  making  a  joke.  Once,  at  a  dinner  with 
Or  Magee,  Archbishop  of  Dublin,  one  of  the  company  was  a  pedantic  collegian, 
who  asked  his  host  whether  he  had  heard  of  the  difference  between  Brinkley 
(afterward  Bishop  of  Cloyne)  and  Pond,  respectively  Astronomers  Royal  of 
Ireland  and  England.  "  Brinkley,"  said  the  bore,  "contends  that  the  parallax 
of  a  Lyrse  is  three  seconds  ;  Pond  says  it  is  only  two,  —  and  the  dispute  is  vio- 
lent." Plunket,  who  was  one  of  the  party,  quietly  remarked  "  Ah,  sir,  it  must 
be  a  very  bad  quarrel,  when  the  seconds  can  not  agree.'''' — When  the  Grenville 
Ministry  was  formed,  in  1806,  Charles  Kendal  Bushe,  suspected  of  being  a  wa- 
verer,  absented  himself  from  Court,  on  the  ground  that  he  was  cabinet-making. 
The  excuse  transpired,  and  Plunket  said  "  Bushe  will  beat  me  at  that  —  I  am 
neither  a  joiner  nor  a  turner." — After  quitting  the  Common  Pleas,  in  1827,  to 
take  the  Great  Seal,  he  was  told  that  his  successors  had  little  or  nothing  to  do. 
"  Well,"  said  he,  "  they're  equal  to  it."  He  could  even  joke  at  his  own  ex- 
pense. On  his  enforced  retirement,  in  1841,  to  make  way  for  Lord  Campbell, 
a  great  storm  arose  on  the  day  of  his  successor's  expected  arrival,  a  friend  said, 
how  sick  of  his  promotion  the  voyage  must  have  made  him.  "  Yes,"  said 
Plunket,  with  a  sardonic  smile,  "  but  it  won't  make  him  throw  up  the  Seals.  —  M. 


118  WILLIAM    CONYfrGHAM    PLtJftKJiT. 

to  which  she  became  entitled  by  his  decease;  and  the  ques- 
tion was,  whether  her  mind  at  the  time  was  perfectly  calm  and 
collected.  Mr.  Plunket  insisted  that  it  was  not  in  human  na- 
ture that  she  could  be  so  at  such  a  crisis. —  "  She  had  received 
a  blow  such  as  stuns  the  strongest  minds  :  after  a  union  of  half 
a  century,  of  uninterrupted  affection,  to  find  the  husband,  the 
friend,  the  daily  companion,  suddenly  called  away  for  ever  !" 
He  was  proceeding  to  describe  the  first  anguish  and  pertur- 
bation of  spirit  that  must  befall  the  survivor  of  such  a  relation, 
when  he  suddenly  recognised  in  the  picture  all  that  he  had 
himself  a  little  while  before  endured.  The  recollection  quite 
subdued  him  —  he  faltered,  and  became  inarticulate  even  to 
sobbing.  I  can  not  describe  the  effect  produced  throughout 
the  court. 

I  have  thus  attempted  to  present  a  sketch  of  this  eminent 
Irishman* — in  matters   of  intellect  unquestionably  the  most 

*  Lord  Plunket,  who  was  born  in  1764,  is  now  (1854)  in  his  ninetieth  year. 
Brought  into  the  Irish  Parliament  by  the  Earl  of  Charlemont  he  bitterly  de- 
nounced the  contemplated  Union,  and  was  violently  personal  on  the  Irish  Sec- 
retary, Lord  Castlereagh,  who  managed  the  ministerial  details.  His  Lordship, 
a  handsome  man  (who,  Sir  Walter  Scott  thought,  was  the  most  distinguished- 
looking  personage  at  the  Coronation  in  1821,  as  he  walked,  unaccompanied,  in 
the  full  dress  of  a  Knight  of  the  Garter),  had  been  married  for  some  years  to  the 
young  and  lovely  daughter  of  the  Earl  of  Buckinghamshire,  and  it  was  their 
misfortune  to  be  childless.  During  a  debate,  when  Lady  Castlereagh  was  pres- 
ent, Plunket  concluded  a  personal  attack  on  her  husband  by  saying,  "  I  can  not 
believe  that  that  constitution,  the  foundations  of  which  were  laid  by  the  wisdom 
of  ages,  and  cemented  by  the  blood  of  patriotic  heroes,  is  to  be  smitten  to  its 
centre  by  such  a  green  and  sapless  twig  as  this !"  The  venom  of  the  stroke, 
imputing  political  and  insinuating  personal  imbecility,  was  deeply  felt.  After 
the  Union,  Plunket  fought  side  by  side  with  Curran,  on  the  popular  side  ;  but, 
in  1803,  he  appeared  against  Robert  Emmett,  as  already  mentioned.  After  the 
Union,  also,  he  had  unsuccessfully  been  a  parliamentary  candidate  for  the  Univer 
sity  of  Dublin.  In  1806,  the  death  of  Pitt  admitted  the  Whigs  to  office.  Self- 
boasting  as  they  had  been,  the  soubriquet  of  "All  the  Talents"  was  given  to 
their  official  capacity.  In  1807,  they  quitted  place,  and  Plunket,  who  would 
have  been  retained  by  their  successors  if  he  pleased,  went  out  with  them ;  noi 
did  he  again  assume  office  until  1822,  when  (at  the  instance  of  the  same  Lord 
Castlereagh  whom  he  had  formerly  attacked,  but  who  desired  parliamentary 
assistance  against  the  hollow  friendship  of  Canning  and  the  open  hostility  of 
Brougham)  he  succeeded  Mr.  Saurin  as  Attorney-General.  He  had  previ- 
ously defended,  in  Parliament,  what  was  called  the  "  Massacre  of  Peterloo,"  in 


HIS    VERSATILE   POWERS.  11 9 

eminent  that  now  exists.  If  I  intended  it  to  be  anything  but 
a  hasty  sketch,  I  should  feel  that  I  have  been  unjust  to  him 
Some  of  his  powers — his  wit  and  irony,  for  example,  in  both 
of  which  he  excels,  and  his  cutting  and  relentless  sarcasm, 
where  vice  and  folly  are  to  be  exposed  —  have  been  altogether 
unnoticed  ;  but  his  is  the  "  versatile  ingenhtm"  and,  in  offering 
the  result  of  my  observations  upon  it,  I  have  been  compelled 
to  select  rather  what  I  could  best  describe,  than  what  I  most 

the  Manchester  riots  of  1819.  As  first  Irish  law-officer  of  the  Crown,  Plunket 
did  not  appear  to  advantage.  When  a  hottle  was  flung  at  the  Viceroy,  in  the 
theatre,  Plunket  hastily  indicted  the  rioters  for  high-treason,  and  as  hastily 
withdrew  the  indictment  before  trial.  His  bills  of  indictment  were  ignored, 
his  ece-officio  prosecutions  defeated,  and  his  Orange  antagonists  cheaply  obtained 
the  honor  of  political  martyrdom.  In  1827,  when  a  new  Premier  was  necessary, 
on  the  illness  of  Lord  Liverpool,  Canning  was  appointed,  and  thought  so  highly 
of  Plunket  as  to  offer  him  a  peerage,  a  seat  in  the  Cabinet,  and  the  high  office 
of  Master  of  the  Rolls  in  England.  Plunket  was  actually  appointed,  but  the 
English  bar,  declaring  that  Westminster  Hall  must  supply  the  new  Judge,  inti- 
mated that  they  would  not  plead  before  Plunket.  The  end  was  that  he  became 
Chief-Justice  of  the  Common  Pleas  in  Ireland,  instead  of  Master  of  the  Rolls 
in  England  —  and  became  a  peer  as  "Baron  Plunket,  of  Newton,  County  of 
Cork."  By  his  speeches  and  his  vote,  he  assisted  in  the  Emancipation  Bill  of 
1829 ;  and  when  the  Whigs  took  office,  in  1830,  Earl  Grey  made  him  Lord- 
Chancellor  of  Ireland,  a  position  which  he  retained  until  December,  1834,  when 
Sir  Robert  Peel,  on  the  change  of  Ministry,  appointed  Sir  Edward  Sugden  (now 
Lord  St.  Leonards,  and  late  Lord-Chancellor  of  England),  an  English  hamster 
of  great  ability.  In  April,  1835,  Plunket  resumed  the  Irish  Chancellorship, 
and  retained  it  until  June,  1841.  The  Melbourne  Ministry,  then  within  three 
months  of  its  dissolution,  wished  to  provide  for  Sir  John  Campbell,  who  had 
been  in  office  nine  years.  His  wife  had  already  been  appointed  a  peeress  in 
her  own  right  (Baroness  Stratheden),  but  he  desired  for  himself  the  retiring 
pension  of  four  thousand  pounds  sterling  always  given  to  an  ex-Chancellor. 
Accordingly,  Lord  Plunket,  whose  judicial  career  had  been  highly  satisfactory, 
received  a  hint  that  he  must  retire !  Plunket,  recollecting  how  the  English 
bar  had  refused  him,  was  reluctant  to  see  an  English  lawyer,  who  knew  nothing 
of  equity,  named  as  his  successor.  He  refused  to  retire,  was  informed  that  he 
would  be  dismissed  if  he  did  not,  and  finally  resigned,  stating  the  whole  case  in 
open  Court,  in  his  farewell  address  to  the  bar.  He  said  he  had  no  share  in 
what  had  taken  place,  directly  or  indirectly,  and  entirely  repudiated  the  change. 
Campbell,  created  a  peer,  heard  a  few  motions  as  Chancellor,  and  went  out, 
shortly  after,  on  the  large  pension  he  had  coveted.^  He  is  now  Chief- Justice 
of  England.  —  Lord  Plunket  retired  into  private  life  in  1841,  and  enjoys  tho 
four  thousand  pounds  pension,  and  a  large  private  fortune,  earned  by  his  pr> 
fessional  labors.  —  M. 


ISO  WILLIAM   CONYNGHAM   PLUtiKfiT. 

admired  ;  and  even  if  I  had  succeeded  in  a  delineation  of  all 
the  powers  that  raise  Mr.  Plunket  above  ordinary  men,  I 
should  have  had  to  add,  that  our  admiration  of  him  is  not 
limited  by  what  we  actually  witness. 

We  speculate  upon  his  great  attributes  of  intellect,  and  ask, 
"  What  might  they  not  have  achieved,  had  his  destiny  placed 
him  in  the  situation  most  favorable  to  their  perfect  develop- 
ment 1  If,  instead  of  wasting  them  upon  questions  of  tran- 
sitory interest,  he  had  dedicated  them  solely  to  the  purposes  of 
general  science  —  to  metaphysics,  mathematics,  legislation, 
morals,  or  (what  is  but  spoken  science)  to  that  best  and  rarest 
kind  of  eloqiience,  which  awakes  the  passions  only  that  they 
may  listen  to  the  voice  of  truth  —  to  what  a  height  and  perma- 
nence of  fame  might  they  not  have  raised  him  V 

These  reflections  perpetually  force  themselves  upon  Mr. 
Pl'iinket's  admirers  :  we  lament  to  see  the  vigor  of  such  a 
mind  squandered  upon  a  profession  and  a  province.  We  are 
incessantly  reminded  that,  high  and  successful  as  his  career  has 
been,  his  opportunities  have  been  far  beneath  his  resources, 
and  thus,  ju^gjpp;  him  rather  by  what  he  could  do  than  what 
he  has  done,  w  ^-e  disposed  to  speak  of  him  in  terms  of  enco- 
mium, which    , .  -.  cords  of  his  genius  will  remain  to  justify- 


CHARLES  KENDAL  BUSHE. 

The  name  of  Charles  Kendal  Bushe  is  not  so  extensively 
known  as  that  of  Plunket  beyond  the  immediate  field  in  which 
his  talents  (which  are  of  the  first  order)  have  been  displayed. 
But  in  Ireland  it  is  almost  uniformly  associated  with  that  of 
Plunket,  by  those  who  descant  upon  the  comparative  merits 
of  their  most  distinguished  advocates.  The  latter  is  better 
fitted  to  the  transactions  of  ordinary  business,  and,  in  a  pro- 
fession which  is  generally  conversant  with  the  details  of  com- 
mon life,  exhibits  a  dexterity  and  astuteness  which  render  him 
the  most  practical,  and,  therefore,  the  ablest  man  at  the  Bar. 
He  is  always  upon  a  level  with  his  subject,  and  puts  forth  his 
faculties,  as  if  they  were  as  subservient  as  his  limbs  to  the  do- 
minion of  his  will,  in  the  most  precise  and  minute  adaptation 
to  the  purposes  for  which  they  may  happen  to  be  required. 
The  self-control  which  his  mind  possesses  in  so  high  and  rare 
a  degree  (and  it  is  more  difficult,  perhaps,  to  men  of  true 
genius  to  descend  from' their  native  elevation  than  to  persons 
of  inferior  endowments  to  raise  their  faculties  to  the  height  of 
a  "  great  argument")  has  given  him  an  almost  undisputed  mas- 
tery in  the  discussion  of  those  topics  which  constitute  the  ha- 
bitual business  of  the  Bar.  His  hearers  are  not  conscious  th.it 
he  is  in  reality  exercising  his  great  powers  while  he  addresses 
them  in  the  plainest  speech  and  apparently  in  the  most  homely 
way. 

An  acute  observer  would  discover  that  his  reasonings  upon 
the  most  vulgar  topic  were  the  perfection  of  art,  and  that  un- 
der the  guise  of  simplicity  he  concealed  the  most  insidious 

Vol.  I.— G 


122  CETAKLES   KENDAL   BUSHE. 

sophistry,  and  subtleties  the  most  acute.  This  seeming  ingen 
uousness  is  the  consummation  of  forensic  ability;  and  however 
it  is  to  be  estimated  in  a  moral  point  of  view,  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  at  the  Bar  it  is  of  incalculable  use.  Mr.  Plunket 
is  the  chief  sophist,  and  for  that  reason  the  most  useful  dis- 
putant in  his  profession ;  and  it  must  be  confessed  that  the 
deliberations  of  a  court  of  justice  do  not  call  so  much  for  the 
display  of  eloquence  as  for  the  ingenious  exercise  of  the  pow- 
ers of  disputation.  I  am  far  from  thinking  Mr.  Bushe  deficient 
in  refinement  and  dexterity;  on  the  contrary,  he  would  be 
conspicuous  for  those  qualities  unless  when  he  is  placed  in 
comparison  with  the  great  arch-hypocrite  of  the  Bar.  But  wh\> 
could  be  his  rival  in  that  innocent  simulation  which  constitute  1 
the  highest  merit  of  a  modern  lawyer1?  The  ingenuity  of 
Bushe  is  too  apparent.  His  angling  is  light  and  delicate  ;  but 
the  fly  is  too  highly  colored,  and  the  hook  glitters  in  the  sun. 
In  the  higher  departments  of  oratory  he  is,  perhaps,  equal  and 
occasionally  superior  to  Mr.  Plunket,  from  the  power  and  en- 
ergy of  his  incomparable  manner;  but  in  the  discharge  of  com- 
mon business  in  a  common  way,  he  holds  a  second,  though  not 
exceedingly  distant  place. 

Mr.  Bushe  is  the  son  of  a  clergyman  of  the  established 
church,  who  resided  at  Kilmurry,  in  the  county  of  Kilkenny, 
in  the  midst  of  the  most  elegant  and  most  accomplished  soci- 
ety in  Ireland.  He  was  in  the  enjoyment  of  a  lucrative  living, 
and  being  of  an  ancient  family,  which  had  established  itself 
in  Ireland  in  the  reign  of  Charles  the  Second,  he  thought  it 
incumbent  upon  him  to  live  upon  a  scale  of  expenditure  more 
consistent  with  Irish  notions  of  dignity  than  with  English 
maxims  of  economy  and  good  sense.  He  was  a  man  of  refined 
manners,  and  of  polished  if  not  of  prudential  habits.  His  son 
Charles  imbibed  from  him  an  ardent  love  of  literature,  and  had 
an  opportunity  from  his  familiar  intercourse  with  the  best  com- 
pany in  the  kingdom,  to  acquire  those  graces  of  manner  which 
render  him  a  model  of  elegance  in  private  life,  and  which,  in 
the  discharge  of  professional  business,  impart  such  a  dignified 
suavity  to  his  demeanor  as  to  charm  the  senses  before  the  un- 
derstanding is  addressed.     His  mother  was  the  sister  of  Major 


TME    HISTORICAL   SOCIETY.  V2% 

General  Sir  John  Doyle,*  and  is  said  to  have  been  a  highly- 
cultivated  woman. 

Mr.  Bushe  received  liis  education  in  the  University  of  Dub- 
lin, and,  I  may  add,  in  the  Historical  Society  which  was  estab- 
lished by  the  students  for  the  cultivation  of  eloquence  and  of 
the  arts  which  are  connected  with  it.  Although  it  derived  its 
appellation  from  the  study  of  history,  to  which  it  was  nomi- 
nally dedicated,  the  political  situation  of  the  country  speedily 
directed  its  pursuits  to  the  acquisition  of  the  faculty  of  public 
speech  ;  through  which  every  man  of  talent  expected  to  rise 
into  eminence,  at  a  period  when  oratory  was  the  great  staple 
commodity  in  the  intellectual  market.  This  institution  rose 
of  its  own  accord  out  of  the  spontaneous  ambition  of  the  stu- 
dents of  the  University.  So  far  from  assisting  its  growth,  the 
fellows  of  the  college  employed  every  expedient  to  repress  it. 
In  the  true  spirit  of  monks  (and  however  they  may  differ  in 
the  forms  of  their  faith,  in  their  habits,  and  in  the  practical 
results  in  which  their  principles  are  illustrated  and  embodied, 
the  monks  of  all  religions  are  inveterately  the  same),  the  su- 
periors of  the  University  took  the  society  under  their  baneful 
protection.  They  attempted  to  hug  it  to  death  in  their  rugged 
and  hirsute   embrace.     The  students,  however,  soon  became 

*  The  late  General  Sir  John  Doyle  was  private  Secretary  to  the  Prince  of 
Wales  for  many  years,  when  that  profligate  was  taking  a  leading  part  in  the 
"  Road  to  Ruin."  Doyle,  who  was  then  only  a  Major  in  the  army,  was  an  Irish- 
man and  had  distinguished  himself  by  some  clever  opposition  speeches  in  the 
•Irish  House  of  Commons. — The  Prince  met  him  accidentally  at  a  large  party, 
was  struck  with  his  intelligence  and  vivacity,  invited  him  to  the  Pavilion,  at 
Brighton,  and  speedily  offered  him  the  most  confidential  post  in  his  household. 
To  his  latest  day,  Doyle  used  to  say  that  George,  Prince  of  Wales,  merited  the 
title  of  "  the  first  gentleman  in  Europe,"  and  it  should  be  noted  that  he  who 
gave  this  opinion  had  spent  all  his  life  in  the  best  society,  at  home  and  abroad. 
Doyle  was  a  wit.  The  Prince  had  gone  to  the  opening  of  Parliament,  wearing 
diamond  epaulettes  on  his  military  uniform.  At  dinner,  Doyle  said  he  had 
been  among  the  crowd,  who  much  admired  the  Prince's  equipage,  and  that  one 
of  them,  looking  at  the  diamond  epaulettes,  said,  "  Tom,  what  amazing  fine 
things  the  Prince  has  got  upon  his  shoulders?"  and  the  other  had  answered, 
11  Ay,  fine  enough,  and  they  will  soon  be  on  our  shoulders."  There  was  a 
smile  all  around  the  royal  table,  for  freedom  of  speech  was  fully  allowed  there, 
and  the  Prince  laughingly  retorted,  "  You  rogue,  that  shaft  could  come  from  no 
bow  but  your  own.  " — M. 


124  CHARLES    KENDAL   BUSitE. 

aware  of  the  real  objects  of  their  interference,  and  were  com- 
pelled, in  order  to  preserve  the  institution  from  the  conse- 
quences of  so  impure  a  connection,  to  recede  from  the  Univer- 
sity, and  hold  their  meetings  beyond  its  walls. 

Mr.  Bushe  had  been  recently  called  to  the  Bar,  but  had  not 
yet  devoted  himself  to  its  severer  studies  with  the  strenuous 
assiduity  which  is  necessary  for  success  in  so  laborious  a  pro- 
fession. But  the  fame  which  he  had  acquired  in  the  society 
itself,  induced  its  rebellious  members  to  apply  to  him  to  pro- 
nounce a  speech  at  the  close  of  the  first  session  which  was 
held  beyond  the  precincts  of  the  college,  for  the  purpose  of 
giving-  the  dignity  and  importance  to  their  proceedings  which 
they  expected  to  derive  from  the  sanction  of  his  distinguished 
name.  Mr.  Bushe  acceded  to  the  request,  and  pronounced  a 
very  eloquent  oration,  which  Mr.  Phillips  has,  I  observe,  inserted 
in  his  collections  of  "  Specimens  of  Irish  Oratory."*     It  is  re- 

*  This  work,  which,  published  in  Dublin  in  1819,  was  republished  in  Phila- 
delphia in  1820,  is  called  "  Specimens  of  Irish  Oratory,"  and  contains,  with 
very  brief  memoirs,  examples  of  the  oratory  of  Burke,  Curran,  Grattan,  Sheri- 
dan, Burrowes,  Bushe,  Plunket,  and  Flood.  Charles  Phillips,  born  at  Sligo, 
in  1788,  graduated  at  Dublin  University,  and  was  called  to  the  Irish  bar  in 
1812,  where  his  florid  oratory  obtained  him  considerable  practice  in  adultery, 
seduction,  and  breach-of-promise-of-marriage  cases.  He  collected  his  speeches 
in  one  volume  in  1817,  and  they  obtained  a  large  sale.  He  also  edited  "  Spe- 
cimens of  Irish  Eloquence,"  wrote  a  poem  called  "  The  Emerald  Isle,"  and 
wrote  "  Recollections  of  Curran,"  which  speedily  ran  through  two  large  edi- 
tions, and  was  reproduced  in  1850,  entirely  recast,  enlarged,  and  improved,  as 
"  Curran  and  his  Contemporaries,"  which  has  gone  into  several  editions,  and 
was  republished  in  New  York,  in  1851.  Phillips  went  to  the  English  bar,  in 
1819,  where  his  peculiar  style  of  eloquence  did  not  please.  He  obtained  ex 
tensive  criminal  practice,  and  adhered  steadily  to  the  liberal  principles  of  his 
youth.  In  1842,  on  the  establishment  of  District  Courts  of  Bankruptcy  in  Eng- 
land, the  influence  of  his  stanch  friend  Loi*d  Brougham  obtained  him  a  com- 
•nissionership  at  Liverpool,  with  a  salary  of  eighteen  hundred  pounds  sterling  a 
year.  He  subsequently  resigned  this,  and  became  one  of  the  London  Com- 
missioners of  the  Insolvents'  Court.  It  is  matter  for  reproach,  as  well  as  regret, 
that,  during  the  last  ten  or  twelve  years  of  comparative  leisure,  Phillips  has  done 
so  little  as  a  literary  man  —  a  calling  in  which  he  has  so  well  acquitted  him 
self.  Curran,  who  much  loved  him,  was  fully  sensible  of  the  faults  of  Phillips's 
early  oratory,  and  said  :  "  There  is  much  more  of  flower  than  figure  or  art ;  more 
of  fancy  than  design.  It  is  like  (as  I  suspect  the  mind  of  the  author  to  be)  a  tree 
in  full  blossom :  shake  it  and  you  have  them  on  the  ground  in  a  minute,  and  it 
would  take  a  season  to  reproduce  them."  —  M. 


CHARACTER    OF   HIS   ELOQUENCE.  125 

markable  for  purity  and  simplicity  of  style,  and  for  an  argu- 
mentative tone,  which,  in  so  young  a  man,  who  had  hitherto 
exercised  himself  upon  topics  which  invited  a  puerile  declama- 
tion, and  the  discussion  of  which  was  a  mere  mockery  of  de- 
bate, afforded  grounds  for  anticipating  that  peculiar  excellence 
which  he  afterward  attained.  A  few  metaphors  are  inter- 
spersed, but  they  are  not  of  the  ordinary  class  of  Irish  illus- 
tration;  and  what  was  unavoidable  in  an  assembly  composed 
of  insurgent  students,  an  hyperbole  is  occasionally  to  be  found 
in  the  course  of  this  very  judicious  speech.  But,  taken  as  a 
whole,  it  bears  the  character  of  the  mature  production  of  a 
vigorous  mind,  rather  than  of  the  prolusion  of  a  juvenile  rhet- 
orician.* 

This  circumstance  is  a  little  remarkable.  The  passion  for 
figurative  decoration  was  at  this  time  at  its  height  in  Ireland. 
The  walls  of  the  parliament  house  resounded  with  dithyram- 
bics,  in  which,  at  the  same  time,  truth  and  nature  were  too 
frequently  sacrificed  to  effect.  The  intellect  of  the  country 
was  in  its  infancy,  and  although  it  exhibited  signs  of  athletic 
vigor,  it  was  pleased  with  the  gorgeous  baubles  which  were 
held  out  for  its  entertainment.  It  is,  therefore,  somewhat  sin- 
gular, that  while  a  taste  of  this  kind  enjoyed  so  wide  and 
almost  universal  a  prevalence,  Mr.  Bushe  should,  at  so  early  a 
period  of  his  professional  life,  have  manifested  a  sense  of  its 
imperfections,  and  have  traced  out  for  himself  a  course  so  dif- 
ferent from  that  which  had  been  pursued  by  men  whose  genius 
had  invested  their  vices  with  so  much  alluring  splendor. 
This  circumstance  is  partly,  perhaps,  to  be  attributed  to  the 
strong  instinct  of  propriety  which  Avas  born  with  his  mind, 
and,  in  some  degree,  to  his  having  passed  a  considerable  time 
out  of  Ireland,  where  he  became  conversant  with  models  of  a 
purer,  if  not  of  a  nobler  eloquence,  than  that  which  was  culti- 
vated  in  the  sister  kingdom.     He  lived  in  France  for  some 

*  The  beautiful  speech  which  Bushe  delivered  from  the  chair  of  the  Histor- 
ical Society,  in  closing-  its  twenty-fourth  session,  in  June,  1794,  was  published 
by  Phillips  in  his  "  Specimens."  Bushe's  own  copy  of  this  book  was  annotated 
by  himself  in  1827,  and  he  has  marked  this  speech  as  "  mostly  puerile. "  Some 
passages  he  noted  as  "  bad,"  some  "  not  good,"  and  only  one  as  "  good." — In 
£*ct.  he  was  very  fastidious  as  to  bis  own  productions.  —  JVt, 


126  CHlELES    KENDAL    EUSHE. 

years,  among  men  of  letters;  and  although  the  revolution  had 
subverted,  in  a  great  degree,  the  principles  of  literature  as 
well  as  of  government,  yet  enough  of  relish  for  classical  beauty 
and  simplicity  had  survived,  among  men  who  had  received 
the  advantages  of  education,  to  furnish  him  with  the  opportu- 
nity, of  which  he  so  advantageously  availed  himself,  of  culti- 
vating a  better  style  of  expression  than  he  would,  in  all 
probability,  have  adopted  had  he  permanently  resided  in 
Ireland. 

It  may  appear  strange  that  I  should  partly  attribute  the 
eminence  in  oratory  to  which  Mr.  Bushe  has  attained,  to  the 
Historical  Society,  after  having  stated  that  he  deviated  so 
widely  from  the  tone  of  elocution  which  prevailed  in  that 
establishment,  and  in  which,  if  there  was  little  of  childishness, 
there  was  much  of  boyhood.  But,  with  all  its  imperfections, 
it  must  be  recollected  that  such  an  institution  afforded  an  occa- 
sion for  the  practice  of  the  art  of  public  speaking,  which  is  as 
much,  perhaps,  the  result  of  practical -acquisition,  as  it  is  of 
natural  endowment.  A  false  ambition  of  ornament  might  pre- 
vail in  its  assemblies,  and  admiration  might  be  won  by  verbose 
extravagance  and  boisterous  inanity  ;  but  a  man  of  genius 
must  still  have  turned  such  an  institution  to  account.  He 
must  have  thrown  out  a  vast  quantity  of  ore,  which  time  and 
circumstance  would  afterward  separate  and  refine.  His  fac- 
ulties must  have  been  put  into  action,  and  he  must  have  learned 
the  art,  as  well  as  tasted  the  delight,  of  stirring  the  hearts 
and  exalting  the  minds  of  a  large  concourse  of  men.  The 
physique  of  oratory  too,  if  I  may  use  the  expression,  must 
have  been  acquired.  A  just  sense  of  the  value  of  gesture  and 
intonation  results  from  the  practice  of  public  speaking;  and 
the  appreciation  of  their  importance  is  necessary  to  their 
attainment.  It  is  for  these  reasons  that  I  am  inclined  to  refer 
a  portion  of  the  prosperity  which  has  accompanied  Mr.  Bushe 
through  his  profession,  to  an  institution,  the  suppression  of 
which  has  been  a  source  of  great  regret  to  every  person  who 
had  the  interests  of  literature  at  heart. 

The  reputation  which  Mr.  Bushe  had   acquired   among  his 
fellow-students,  attended  him  to  his  profession  ;  and  in  a  very 


HARMONY    OF   HIS   VOICE.  12'j 

sliort  period,  lie  rose  into  the  public  notice  as  an  advocate  of 
distinguished  abilities.  It  was,  indeed,  impossible  that  he 
should  remain  in  obscurity.  His  genius  was  not  of  such  a 
character  as  to  stand  in  need  of  a  great  subject  for  its  display. 
The  most  trivial  business  furnished  him  with  an  occasion  to 
produce  a  striking  effect.  There  are  some  men  who  require  a 
lofty  theme  for  the  manifestation  of  their  powers.  Their 
minds  demand  the  stimulus  of  high  passion,  and  are  slow  and 
sluggish  unless  awakened  by  the  excitement  which  great  inter- 
ests afford. 

This  is  peculiarly  the  case  with  Mr.  Burrowes,*  who,  upon 
a  noble  topic,  is  one  of  the  ablest  advocates  at  the  Irish  bar 
but  who  seems  oppressed  by  the  very  levity  of  a  petty  subject 
and  sinks  under  its  inanity. 

He  is  in  every  respect  the  opposite  of  Mr.  Bushe,  who  could 
not  open  his  lips,  or  raise  his  hand,  without  immediately  exci- 
ting and  almost  captivating  the  attention  of  every  man  around 
him.  There  is  a  peculiar  mellowness  and  deep  sweetness  in 
his  voice,  the  lower  tones  of  which  might,  almost  without  haz- 
ard of  exaggeration,  be  compared  to  the  most  delicate  notes 
of  an  organ,  when  touched  with  a  fine  but  solemn  hand.  It  is 
a  voice  full  of  manly  melody.  There  is  no  touch  of  effeminacy 
about  it.  It  possesses  abundance  as  well  as  harmony,  and  is 
not  more  remarkable  for  its  sweetness  than  in  its  sonorous 
depth.  His  attitude  and  gesture  are  the  perfection  of  "  easy 
art"  —  every  movement  of  his  body  appears  to  be  swayed  and 
informed  by  a  dignified  and  natural  grace.  His  countenance 
is  of  the  finest  order  of  fine  faces,  and  contains  an  expression 
of  magnanimous  frankness,  that,  in  the  enforcement  of  any 
cause  which  he  undertakes  to  advocate,  invests  him  with  such 
a  semblance   of  sincerity,  as  to  lend  to  his  assertion   of  fact, 

*  Burrowes  was  one  of  the  most  absent  of  men.  He  it  was  who  was  found  at 
bieakfast-time,  standing  by  the  fire  with  an  egg-  in  his  hand  and  his  watch  in 
the  saucepan.  But,  as  a  banister,  he  had  great  influence  with  a  jury  —  some 
times  reaching  the  purest  eloquence.  "  Devoid  of  every  grace  and  every  art," 
says  Phillips,"  ungainly  in  figure,  awkward  in  action,  discordant  in  voice,  no 
man  more  riveted  the  attention  of  an  audience  and  more  repaid  it.  His  mind 
was  of  the  very  highest  order ;  his  manner  forced  the  conviction  of  his  sincerity- 
and  his  arguments  were  clothed  in  language  chaste  and  vigorous." — IV$, 


128  CHARLES    KENDAL    BUSHE. 

or  to  his  vindication  of  good  principle,  an  irresistible  force.*  It 
was  not  wonderful  that  he  should  have  advanced  with  extreme 
rapidity  in  his  profession,  seconded  as  he  was  by  such  high 
advantages.  It  was  speedily  perceived  that  he  possessed  an 
almost  commanding  influence  with  the  jury ;  and  he  was  in 
consequence  employed  in  every  case  of  magnitude,  which 
called  for  the  exertion  of  such  eminent  faculties  as  he  mani- 
fested upon  every  occasion  in  which  his  powers  were  put  into 
requisition. 

Talents  of  so  distinguished  a  kind  could  not  fail  to  raise  him 
into  political  consequence,  as  well  as  to  insure  his  professional 
success.  The  chief  object  of  every  young  man  of  abilities  at  the 
bar  Avas  to  obtain  a  seat  in  Parliament.  It  secured  him  the 
applause  of  his  country  if  he  devoted  himself  to  her  interest; 
or,  if  he  enlisted  himself  under  the  gilded  banners  of  the  min- 
ister, place,  pension,  and  authority,  were  the  certain  remu- 
nerations of  the  profligate  services  which  his  talents  enabled 
him  to  bestow  upon  a  government,  which  had  reduced  corrup- 
tion into  system,  and  was  well  aware  that  it  was  only  by  the 
debasement  of  her  legislature  that  Ireland  could  be  kept  under 
its  control.  The  mind  of  Mr.  Bushe  was  of  too  noble  a  cast  to 
lend  itself  to  purposes  so  uncongenial  to  a  free  and  lofty  spirit; 
and  he  preferred  the  freedom  of  his  country,  and  the  retributive 
consciousness  of  the  approbation  of  his  own  heart,  to  the  igno- 
minious distinctions  with  which  the  administration  would  have 
been  glad  to  reward  the  dereliction  of  what  he  owed  to  Ireland 
and  to  himself.  Accordingly  we  find,  that  Mr.  Bushe  threw 
all  the  energy  of  his  youth  into  opposition  to  a  measure  which 
he  considered  fatal  to  that  greatness  which  Nature  appeared 
to  have  intended  that  his  country  should  attain ;  and  to  the 
last  he  stood  among  the  band  of  patriots  who  offered  a  gen- 
erous but  unavailing  resistance  to  a  legislative  Union  with 
Great  Britain. 

*  Bushe  was  by  no  means  a  handsome  man.  Phillips  speaking  of  his  "  Mir- 
abeau-formed  figure  —  Mirabeau,  indeed,  in  shape  and  genius,  without  the  alloy  o) 
Ills  vices  or  his  crimes.  What  sweetness  there  is  in  bis  smile !  what  though/ 
in  his  brow !  what  pure  benevolence  in  the  beaming  of  his  blue  unclouded 
*ye!"—  M 


RESULTS    OF    THE    UNION.  129 

However,  as  an  Englishman,  I  may  rejoice  in  an  event, 
which,  if  followed  by  Roman  Catholic  Emancipation,  will 
ultimately  abolish  all  national  antipathy,  and  give  a  permanent 
consolidation  to  the  empire  ;  it  can  not  be  fairly  questioned  that 
every  native  of  Ireland  ought  to  have  felt  that  her  existence 
was  at  stake,  and  that,  in  place  of  making  those  advances  in 
power,  wealth,  and  civilization,  to  which  her  natural  advan- 
tages would  have  inevitably  led,  she  must  of  necessity  sustain 
a  declension  as  rapid  as  her  progress  toward  improvement  had 
previously  been,  and  sink  into  the  provincial  inferiority  to 
which  she  is  now  reduced.  This  conviction,  the  justice  of 
which  has  been  so  well  exemplified  by  the  event,  prevailed 
through  Ireland;  and  it  required  all  the  seductions  which  the 
minister  could  employ,  to  produce  the  sentence  of  self-annihi- 
lation, which  he  at  last  succeeded  in  persuading  a  servile 
legislature  to  pronounce.  To  the  honor  of  the  Irish  Bar,  the 
great  majority  of  its  members  were  faithful  to  the  national 
cause ;  and  Curran,  Plunket,  Ponsonby,*  Saurin,  Burrowes, 
and  Bushe,  accomplished  all  that  eloquence  and  patriotism 
could  effect,  in  opposition  to  the  mercenaries,  who  had  sold  the 
dignity  of  their  profession,  as  well  as  the  independence  of 
their  country,  in  exchange  for  that  ignoble  station,  to  which, 
by  their  slimy  profligacies,  they  were  enabled  to  crawl  up. 
Bushe  was  the  youngest  of  these  able  and  honest  men;  but  he 
was  among  the  most  conspicuous  of  them  all. 

In  this  strenuous  resistance  which  was  offered  by  the  re- 
spectable portions  of  the  Irish  Bar  to  the  measure  which  de- 
prived Ireland  of  the  advantages  of  a  local  legislature,  a  con- 

*  George  Ponsonby,  whose  father  had  been  speaker  of  the  Irish  House  of 
Commons,  was  bom  in  1755,  called  to  the  Irish  bar  in  1780,  was  a  violent  pai- 
liamentary  opponent  of  the  Irish  ministry,  was  appointed  Lord  Chancellor  of 
Ireland,  in  180b,  by  "  All  the  Talents"  Cabinet,  procured  a  peerage  at  the 
same  time  for  his  elder  brother,  quitted  office  with  his  colleagues  in  1807,  on 
the  retiring  pension  of  four  thousand  pounds  sterling  a  year,  became  a  distin- 
guished member  of  the  Opposition,  and  died  in  July,  1817.  He  was  not  elo- 
quent. A  clever  parody  on  Moore's  "  Believe  me  if  all  those  endearing  young 
charms"  introduces  his  name  thus  — 

"  And  Ponsonby  leaves  the  debate  when  he  sets, 
Just  as  dark  as  it  wus  wV.ea  he  rose." — M. 

6* 


130  CHARLES   KENDAL   BUSHE. 

sciousness  of  deep  personal  interest  must  have  been  mingled 
with  their  public  virtue ;  for,  it  was  not  difficult  to  foresee  that 
the  profession  from  which  the  government  was  compelled  to 
make  the  selection  of  its  parliamentary  advocates,  and  to 
which  the  country  looked  for  its  ablest  support,  must  sustain  a 
fatal  injury,  from  the  deprivation  of  the  opportunities  of  venal- 
ity upon  one  hand,  and  of  profitable  patriotism  upon  the 
other.  The  House  of  Commons  was  the  field  to  which  almost 
every  lawyer  of  abilities  directed  his  hopes  of  eminence  rather 
than  to  the  courts  of  law;  and  it  must  be  acknowledged,  that 
with  that  field  the  career  to  high  fame  is  closed  upon  the 
profession.  Money  may  now  be  made  in  equal  abundance  by 
laborious  ability  (and,  indeed,  the  quantity  of  talent  and  of 
industry  at  the  Irish  Bar  demand  in  every  individual  who 
aims  at  important  success  a  combination  of  both) ;  but  no  very 
valuable  reputation  can  be  obtained. 

Perhaps  in  the  estimate  of  black-letter  erudition  the  change 
is  not  to  be  deplored  :  and  unquestionably  the  knowledge  of 
law  (for  a  few  years  ago  the  majority  of  barristers  in  full  prac- 
tice were  ignorant  of  its  elementary  principles)  has  consider- 
ably increased,  and  English  habits  of  business  and  of  diligence 
are  gradually  beginning  to  appear.  But  the  elevated  objects 
of  ambition,  worthy  of  great  faculties  and  of  great  minds,  were 
withdrawn  for  ever.  Mr.  Bushe  must  have  repined  at  the 
prospect.  He  would  naturally  have  sought  for  mines  of  gold 
amid  the  heights  of  fame,  and  he  was  now  reduced  to  the 
necessity  of  digging  for  it  in  an  obscure  and  dreary  level.  It 
is  well-known  that  Mr.  Plunket  had  at  the  time  entertained 
the  intention  of  going  to  the  English  Bar,  in  consequence  of 
the  exportation  of  the  legislature;*  but  the  cautious  timidity 
of  his  advisers  induced  him  to  abandon  the  idea.  I  am  not 
aware  whether  Mr.  Bushe  had  ever  proposed  ^o  himself  an 
abandonment  of  a  country,  from  which  true  genius  must  have 
been  tempted  to  become  an  absentee.     But  it  is  likely  that  his 

*  Cm-ran  was  so  dispirited  with  what  passed  in  the  Irish  "  Reign  of  Terror," 
in  1798,  that  though  then  forty-eight  years  old,  he  also  had  serious  thoughts 
of  ahandoning  the  Irish  for  the  English  bar.  He  stated  this  fact  in  one  of  his 
speeches  in  defence  of  the  state  prisoners. — M. 


LORD    CASTLEREAGH.  131 

pecuniary  circumstances,  which,  in  consequence  of  his  spon- 
taneous generosity  in  paying  off  his  father's  debts  (his  own 
sense  of  duty  had  rendered  them  debts  of  honor  in  his  mind) 
were  at  this  period  extremely  contracted,  must  have  prevented 
him  from  engaging  in  so  adventurous  an  enterprise. 

To  him,  individually,  however,  if  the  Union  was  accom- 
panied with  many  evils,  it  was  also  attended  with  counter- 
vailing benefits.  Had  the  Irish  Parliament  been  permitted  to 
exist,  Mr.  Bushe  would,  in  all  probability,  have  continued  in 
opposition  to  the  government,  upon  questions  to  which  much 
importance  would  have  been  annexed.  Catholic  Emancipa- 
tion, which  is  now  not  only  innocent,  but  in  the  mind  of  almost 
every  enlightened  man  has  become  indispensable,  would  have 
been  regarded  as  pregnant  with  danger  to  the  state.  Mr. 
Bushe,  I  am  satisfied,  could  never  have  brought  himself  to 
resist  what  his  own  instincts  must  have  taught  him  to  be  due 
to  that  justice  which  he  would  have  considered  as  paramount 
to  expediency.  Many  obstacles  would  have  stood  in  the  way 
of  a  sincere  reconciliation  with  the  government,  and  he  could 
not  afford  to  play  the  part  of  Fabricius.  Whether  the  argu- 
ments which  Lord  Castlereagh*  knew  so  well  how  to  apply, 

*  It  was  Robert  Stewart,  Lord  Castlereagh  (who  succeeded  his  father  in 
1821,  as  Marquis  of  Londonderry),  who  chiefly  brought  about  the  Union.  Born 
in  1769,  he  entered  the  Irish  parliament  in  early  manhood,  when  Mr.  Stewart, 
after  a  contest  which  cost  thirty  thousand  pounds  sterling,  joined  the  opposi- 
tion, and  advocated  Parliamentary  Reform,  which  Pitt  then  favored.  When 
he  became  a  member  of  the  British  Parliament,  he  became  ministerial.  In 
1797,  after  he  had  become  Lord  Castlereagh,  he  returned  tothe  Irish  Parlia- 
ment and  was  made  Keeper  of  the  Privy  Seal  in  Ireland,  and,  soon  after,  one 
of  the  Lords  of  the  Treasury.  In  1798,  he  became  Irish  Secretary,  and 
wielded  immense  power.  In  1805,  still  sitting  in  the  Imperial  Parliament  for 
the  county  of  Down,  he  was  admitted  into  the  British  Cabinet,  retired  on  the 
death  of  Mr.  Pitt,  but  resumed  office  in  1807,  when  the  Grenville  Ministry 
broke  up.  In  1809,  quarrelling  with  Mr.  Canning,  whom  he  wounded  in  a 
duel,  he  quitted  office,  but  succeeded  the  Marquis  Wellesley,  in  1812,  as  For- 
eign Secretary,  which  office  he  retained  until  his  suicide,  in  August,  1822. 
He  took  part  in  the  negotiations  at  the  Congress  of  Vienna,  after  the  fall  of 
Napoleon.  From  that  time  until  the  close  of  his  life,  he  was  leader  of  the 
ministerial  party,  and  governed  the  British  empire  with  a  strong  hand.  Con- 
stant mental  labor  J^d  to  insanity  and  death.  At  his  funeral^  when  his  remains 
were  entering  Westminster  Abbey,  where  he  was  buried,  the  populace  gave 


132  CHARLES    KENDAL   BUSHE. 

and  before  which,  in  the  estimate  of  the  House  of  Commons, 
all  the  eloquence  of  Grattan  was  reduced  into  a  magnificent 
evaporation,  would  haA^e  prevailed  upon  Mr.  Bushe,  as  they 
did  with  the  majority  of  the  Irish  members,  it  is  unnecessary 
to  conjecture;  but  unquestionably  had  not  the  Union  passed, 
he  must  have  abandoned  his  political  opinions  before  he  could 
have  been  raised  to  office.  When,  however,  that  measure  was 
carried,  a  compromise  became  easy,  and  was  not,  in  my 
opinion,  dishonorable. 

Accordingly,  although  he  had  opposed  the  government  on 
the  measure  which  they  had  most  at  heart,  their  just  sense  of 
his  talents  induced  them  to  offer  him  the  place  of  Solicitor- 
General,  to  which  he  was  promoted  in  thirteen  years  after  he 
had  been  called  to  the  Bar.  That  office  he  has  since  held, 
and  rendered  the  most  important  services  to  the  minister, 
without,  perhaps,  at  the  same  time,  ever  having  been  guilty  of 
any  direct  dereliction  of  his  former  opinions.  He  was  placed, 
indeed,  in  rather  an  embarrassing  condition ;  for  his  associate, 
or  rather,  his  superintendent  in  office,  Mr.  Saurin,*  was  con- 
spicuous for  his  hatred  to  the  Roman  Catholic  cause,  of  which 
Mr.  Bushe  had  been,  and  still  professed  himself,  the  earnest 
friend.  This  antipathy  to  the  Roman  Catholics  formed  the 
leading,  I  may  say,  the  only  feature,  in  the  political  character 
of  Saurin,  who  had  simplified  the  theory  of  government  in 
Ireland,  by  almost  making  its  perfection  consist  in  the  oppres- 
sion of  a  majority  of  its  people.  Bushe,  on  the  other  hand, 
had  often  declared,  that  he  considered  the  general  degradation 
of  so  large  a  class  of  the  community  as  incompatible  with  na- 
tional felicity. 

This  difference  of  opinion  is  said  to  have  produced  a  want 
of  cordiality  between  the  two  servants  of  the  crown  :  Bushe, 
however,  with   all  his   liberality  of  feeling   (and   I   have   no 

three  shouts  of  joy  over  his  coffin.  A  like  demonstration  marked  the  funeral 
of  Lord  Chancellor  Clare,  in  Ireland ;  he  had  threatened  to  make  the  Irish 
people  "  tame  as  cats,"  and  the  exasperated  thousands  who  gladly  witnessed 
the  close  of  his  career,  flung  heaps  of  dead  cats  upon  his  coffin. —  M. 

*  Mr.  Saurin,  A*ttorney-General  to  Ireland  from  1807  until  1822,  is  the  sul* 
ject  of  a  subsequent  sketch.  —  M. 


THE   CATHOLIC   BOAttD.  133 

doubt  that  Ms  professions  were  entirely  sincere),  was  of  infin- 
itely more  use  to  the  government  than  Saurin  could  possibly 
have  been,  when  the  suppression  of  the  Roman  Catholic  board* 
was  resolved  upon.  The  latter,  upon  the  trial  of  the  delegates, 
exhibited  a  sombre  virulence,  which  was  calculated  to  excite 
wonder  rather  than  conviction.  Its  gloomy  animosity  was 
without  a  ray  of  eloquence. 

Bushe  produced  a  very  different  effect.  He  stood  before  the 
jury  as  the  advocate  of  the  Catholic  cause,  to  suppress  the 
Rom;fn  Catholic  board.  The  members  of  that  body  had  been 
designated  as  miscreants  by  Mr.  Saurin  (that  learned  gentle- 
man appears  to  be  averse  to  any  circumlocutory  form  of  phrase) ; 
Solicitor-General  Bushe  called  them  his  friends.  With  a  con- 
summate wile  he  professed  himself  the  champion  of  the  people, 
and  put  forth  all  his  ardor  in  insisting  upon  the  necessity  of 
concession  to  six  millions  of  men.  To  the  utterance  of  these 
sentiments,  which  astonished  Mr.  Saurin,  he  annexed  the  full 
power  of  his  wonderful  delivery .t  His  countenance  became 
inflamed ;  his  voice  assumed  all  the  varieties  of  its  most  im- 
passioned intonation  ;  and  his  person  was  informed  and  almost 
elevated  by  the  consciousness  of  the  noble  thoughts  which  he 
was  enforcing,  for  the  purpose  of  investing  the  very  fallacies 

*  The  Roman  Catholic  Board  was  the  precursor  of  the  Catholic  Association 
of  1825.  Before  it  dissolved,  it  voted  O'Connell  a  service  of  plate  worth  one 
thousand  pounds  sterling,  as  an  acknowledgment  of  his  zeal  and  ability.  —  M. 

t  Bushe's  manner  must  have  been  very  good.  Phillips,  writing  in  1818,  thus 
described  it:  "To  be  properly  appreciated,  Bushe  must  be  seen  aiid  heard. 
He  is  the  living  justification  of  Demosthenes'  dictum  —  emphatically  the  orator 
of  manner.  His  eye  —  his  face  —  his  gesture  —  his  very  hand,  speaks;  all 
grace,  all  sweetness,  all  expression — his  tongue,  dropping  manna,  is,  perhaps, 
the  most  silent  organ  of  his  oratory."  In  1850,  Phillips  again  said:  "  By  na- 
ture enrich0 1  with  the  rare  gift  of  genius,  he  engrafts  on  it  every  grace  that  art 
can  furnish  The  9weet-toned  tongue,  lavishing  profusely  the  treasures  of  lan- 
guage, intellect,  and  learning,  speaks  not  more  expressively  to  heart  or  head, 
than  the  glance,  the  action,  the  attitude,  which  wait  upon  his  words,  as  it  were, 
with  an  embodied  eloquence."  He  subsequently  praised  the  consummate  act- 
ing, where  "  not  one  trace  of  art  betrays  the  toil  by  which  it  has  been  fashioned 
into  Nature's  image,"  and  eulogizes  "  the  might  of  his  reasoning,  the  music  of 
bis  diction,  and  the  absolute  enchantment  of  his  exquisite  delivery."  flu*  is 
high  praise,  but  most  of  his  contemporaries  have  said  as  much.  —  M. 


134  CHARLES   KENDAL   BtJSHti. 

which  he  intended  to  inculcate  with  the  splendid  semblances 
of  truth. 

After  having  wrought  his  hearers  to  a  species  of  enthusiasm, 
and  alarmed  Attorney-General  Saurin  by  declaring,  with  an 
attitude  almost  as  noble  as  the  sentiment  which  it  M^as  intended 
to  set  off,  that  he  would  throw  the  constitution  to  his  Catholic 
countrymen  as  widely  open  as  his  own  breast,  he  suddenly 
turned  back,  and,  after  one  of  those  pauses,  the  effect  of  which 
can  be  felt  by  those  only  who  have  been  present  upon  such 
occasions,  in  the  name  of  those  very  principles  of  justice ^which 
he  had  so  powerfully  laid  down,  he  implored  the  jury  to  sup- 
press an  institution  in  the  country,  which  he  asserted  to  be  the 
greatest  obstacle  to  the  success  of  that  measure,  for  the  attain- 
ment of  which  it  had  been  ostensibly  established. 

The  eloquence  of  Mr.  Bushe,  assisted  by  certain  contrivances 
behind  the  scenes,  to  which  government  is,  in  Dublin,  occa- 
sionally obliged  to  resort,  produced  the  intended  effect.  I 
doubt  not  that  a  jury  so  properly  compounded  (the  panel  of 
which,  if  not  suggested,  was  at  least  revised)  would  have  given 
a  verdict  for  the  crown,  although  Mr.  Bushe  had  never  ad- 
dressed them.  But  the  government  stood  in  need  of  something 
more  than  a  mere  verdict.  It  was  necessary  to  give  plausi- 
bility to  their  proceedings,  and  they  found  it  in  the  oratory  of 
this  distinguished  advocate.  Is  it  not  a  little  surprising  that 
Mr.  Bushe  should,  in  despite  of  the  vigor  of  his  exertions  against 
the  Catholic  board,  and  their  success,  have  still  retained  his 
popularity  1  It  would  be  natural  that  such  services  as  he  con- 
ferred upon  the  ministry,  which  appeared  so  much  at  variance 
with  the  interests,  and  in  which  he  acted  a  part  so  diametri- 
cally in  opposition  to  the  passions  of  the  people,  should  have 
generated  a  feeling  of  antipathy  against  him.  But  the  event 
was  otherwise.  He  had  previously  ingratiated  himself  so  much 
in  the  general  liking,  and  so  liberal  an  allowance  was  made 
for  the  urgency  of  the  circumstances  in  which  he  was  placed, 
that  be  retained  the  favor  not  only  of  the  better  classes  among 
the  Roman  Catholics,  Vut  did  not  lose  the  partialities  of  the 
populace  itself.     At  all   events,  the  benefits  he  rendered  to  the 


^Hk  chief  baron's  case.  135 

government  were  most  material,  and  gave  him  the  strongest 
claims  upon  their  gratitude.* 

Another  remarkable  instance  occurred  not  very  long  ago,  of 
the  value  of  such  a  man  to  the  Irish  administration,  and  it  is 
the  more  deserving  of  mention,  as  it  is  connected  with  circum- 
stances which  have  excited  no  inconsiderable  interest  in  the 
House  of  Commons,  and  brought  Mr.  Plunket  and  his  rival  into 
an  immediate  and  honorable  competition.  I  allude  to  the  case 
of  the  Chief  Baron  0'Grady,f  when  he  set  up  a  claim  to  nomi- 
nate to  the  office  of  clerk  of  the  pleas  in  the  Court  of  Exche- 
quer in  Ireland.  The  prize  for  which  the  learned  Judge  was 
adventuring  was  a  great  one,  and  well  worth  the  daring  experi- 
ment for  which  he  exposed  himself  to  the  permanent  indigna- 
tion of  the  government.  The  salary  of  the  office  was  to  be 
counted  by  thousands,  and  the  Chief  Baron  thought  it  would 
be  as  conducive  to  the  public  interests,  and  as  consistent  with 
the  pure  administration  of  justice,  that  he  should,  appoint  one 
of  his  own  family  to  fill  the  vacancy  which  had  occurred,  as 
that  the  local  ministry  of  Ireland  should  make  the  appoint- 
ment.    The  matter  was  brought  before  Parliament ;  and  much 

*  At  Kilkenny  private  theatricals,  when  pressed  for  an  opinion,  he  said  that 
he  preferred  the  prompter,  for  he  heard  the  most  and  saw  the  least  of  him.  At 
a  dinner  given  by  a  Dublin  Orangeman,  when  politics  ran  high,  and  Bushe  was 
suspected  of  holding  pro-Catholic  opinions,  the  host  indulged  so  freely  that  he 
fell  under  the  table.  The  Duke  of  Richmond,  who  then  was  Viceroy,  picked 
him  up  and  replaced  him  in  the  chair.  "  My  Lord  Duke,"  said  Bushe,  "  though 
you  say  I  am  attached  to  the  Catholics,  at  all  events  I  never  assisted  at  the 
elevation  of  the  Host."  Sir  Robert  Peel,  who  was  present,  related  this  bon-mot. 
One  of  Bushe's  relations,  who  rarely  indulged  in  any  ablutions,  complained  of  a 
sore  throat.  "  Fill  a  pail  with  hot  water,  until  it  reach  your  knees ;  then  take 
a  pint  of  oatmeal,  and  scrub  your  legs  with  it  for  quarter  of  an  hour,"  was  what 
Bushe  recommended  as  a  remedy.  "  Why,  hang  it !  man,"  said  the  other, 
"that's  washing  oiie's  feet" —  "I  admit,  my  dear  fellow,"  replied  Bushe, 
gravely,  "it  is  liable  to  that  objection."  —  M. 

t  Standish  O'Grady,  born  in  1766,  called  to  the  bar  in  1787,  appointed 
Attorney-General  for  Ireland  in  1803,  and  made  Chief  Baron  of  the  Irish  Ex- 
chequer, which  office  he  held  until  1831,  when  he  was  created  Viscount  Guil- 
lamore  and  Baron  O'Grady,  in  the  peerage  of  Ireland.  He  died  April  21,  1840, 
aged  seventy-four.  He  was  a  man  of  shrewd  and  caustic  wit,  a  good  lawyer, 
and  a  social  companion.  He  was  veiy  proud  of  his  family,  which  was  one  of  the 
•ldest  in  Ireland.  —  M. 


136  CHAELES  KEttDAL  btisiiE. 

was  saicl,  though  I  think  unjustly,  upon  the  ambitious  cupidity 
of  his  pretensions.  The  right  of  nomination  was  made  the 
subject  of  legal  proceedings  by  the  Crown;  and  the  Attorney- 
General,  Mr.  Saurin,  thought  proper  to  controvert  the  claims 
of  the  Chief  Baron  in  the  shape  of  a  quo  warranto,  which  was 
considered  a  harsh  and  vexatious  course  by  the  friends  of  the 
learned  Judge,  in  order  to  ascertain  the  naked  question  of 
right.  The  latter  secured  Mr.  Plunket  as  his  advocate.  He 
had  been  his  early  friend,  and  had  contributed,  it  was  said,  to 
raise  him  to  the  place  of  Solicitor  when  he  was  himself  ap- 
pointed to  that  of  Attorney-General,  and  had  lived  with  him 
upon  terms  of  the  most  familiar  intercourse.  It  was  stated  — 
but  I  can  not  answer  for  the  truth  of  the  general  report  —  that 
he  sent  him  a  fee  of  three  hundred  pounds,  which  Mr.  Plunket 
returned,  but  which  the  Chief  Baron's  knowledge  of  human 
nature  (and  no  man  is  more  deeply  read  in  it)  insisted  upon 
his  acceptance  —  partly,  perhaps,  because  he  did  not  wish  to 
be  encumbered  with  an  unremunerated  obligation,  and  no 
doubt  because  he  was  convinced,  as  every  lawyer  is  by  his 
professional  experience,  that  the  greatest  talents  stand  in  need 
of  a  pecuniary  excitation,  and  that  the  emotions  of  friendship 
must  be  stimulated  by  that  sense  of  duty  which  is  imposed  by 
the  actual  perception  of  gold.*  I  am  sure  that  Mr.  Plunket 
would  have  strained  his  mind  to  the  utmost  pitch,  without  this 
additional  incentive,  upon  behalf  of  his  learned  friend ;  but 
still  the  Chief  Baron  exhibited  his  accustomed  sagacity,  in  in- 
sisting upon  the  payment  of  a  fee. 

This  was  a  great  cause.  The  best  talents  at  the  bar  were 
arrayed  upon  both  sides.  The  issue  was  one  of  the  highest 
importance,  and  to  which  the  legislature  looked  forward  with 
anxiety.  The  character  of  one  of  the  chief  Judges  of  the  land 
was  in  some  degree  at  stake,  as  well  as  the  claims  which  he 
had  so  enterprisingly  advanced;  and  every  circumstance  con- 
spired to  impart  an  interest  to  the  proceedings,  which  does  not 

*  It  is  recorded  of  the  eminent  Dr.  Radcliffe,  founder  of  the  library  at  Ox- 
ford which  bears  his  name,  that  when  he  felt  unwell  he  used  always  to  take  a 
guinea  out  of  one  pocket  and  deposite  it  in  another  (as  a  fee),  befox-e  he  would 
feel  his  own  pulse  and  prescribe  for  himself.  —  M. 


BTJSHE*S   REPLY.  137 

frequently  arise.  Mr.  Saurin  stated  the  case  for  the  Crown 
with  his  usual  solemnity  and  deliberation,  and  with  that  accu- 
racy and  simplicity  which  render  him  so  valuable  an  advocate 
in  a  court  of  equity.  He  was  followed  by  Mr.  Plunket,  who 
entered  warmly  into  the  feelings  of  his  client,  and  thought  that 
an  unfair  mode  of  proceeding  had  been  adopted  in  his  regard. 
He  exhibited  in  his  reply  that  fierce  spirit  of  sarcasm  which 
he  has  not  yet  fully  displayed  in  the  House  of  Commons, 
though  it  is  one  of  the  principal  ingredients  in  his  eloquence. 
His  metaphors  are  generally  sneers,  and  his  flowers  of  speech 
are  the  aconite  in  full  blow.  He  did  not  omit  the  opportunity 
of  falling  upon  his  political  antagonist,  in  whom  he  left  many 
a  scar,  which,  though  half-healed,  are  visible  to  the  present 
day.  His  oration  was  as  much  a  satire  as  an  argument,  and 
exhibited  in  their  perfection  the  various  attributes  of  his  mind. 

As  for  Bushe,  who  had  to  reply,  his  oratorical  ambition  was 
in  all  probability  powerfully  excited  by  the  sentiment  of  emu- 
lation, and  he  exerted  all  the  resources  of  his  intellect  in  the 
contest.  His  speech  was  a  masterpiece ;  and  in  the  general 
opinion,  in  those  parts  of  it  which  principally  consisted  of  de- 
clamatory vituperation,  he  won  the  palm  from  his  competitor. 
He  was  pure,  lofty,  dignified,  and  generously  impassioned.  If 
his  reasoning  was  not  so  subtile  and  condensed,  it  was  more 
guileless  and  persuasive,  and  his  delivery  far  more  impressive 
and  of  a  higher  and  more  commanding  tone.  A  very  accurate 
and  cold-blooded  observer  would  have  perceived,  perhaps,  in 
the  speech  of  Mr.  Plunket,  a  deeper  current  of  thought  and  a 
more  vigorous  and  comprehensive  intellect :  but  the  great  pro- 
portion of  a  large  assembly  would  have  preferred  the  eloquence 
of  Bushe.  The  true  value  of  it  can  not  be  justly  estimated  by 
any  particular  quotations,  as  the  chief  merit  of  all  his  speeches 
consists  in  the  unity  and  proportion  of  the  whole,  rather  than 
the  beauty  and  perfection  of  the  details.* 

The  great  reputation  obtained  by  Mr.  Plunket  in  the  House 
of  Commons,  and  which  has  given  him  a  sway  so  much  more 
important,  and  a  station  so  much  more  valuable  than  any  pro- 

*  Brougham  said  of  Bushe's  five  hours'  speech  in  the  Trimbleston  cause,  that 
the  narrative  of  Livy  himself  did  not  surpass  that  great  effort.  —  M. 


138  CitARLES   KENDAL   BUSHE. 

fessional  elevation,  no  matter  Low  exalted,  can  bestow  must 
have  often  excited  in  the  mind  of  Mr.  Bushe,  as  well  as  in  his 
admirers,  a  feeling  of  regret  that  he  did  not  offer  himself  as  a 
candidate  for  a  seat  in  the  Imperial  Parliament.  It  is  the  opin- 
ion of  all  those  who  have  had  the  opportunity  of  hearing. Mr. 
Bushe,  that  he  would  have  made  a  very  great  figure  in  the 
English  House  of  Commons  ;  and  for  the  purpose  of  enabling 
those  who  have  not  heard  him  to  form  an  estimate  of  the  like- 
lihood of  his  success  in  that  assembly,  and  of  the  frame  and 
character  of  his  eloquence,  a  general  delineation  of  this  accom- 
plished advocate  may  not  be  inappropriate. 

The  first  circumstance  which  offers  itself  to  the  mind  of  any 
man,  who  recalls  the  recollection  of  Bushe,  in  order  to  furnish 
a  description  of  his  rhetorical  attributes,  is  his  delivery.  In 
bringing  the  remembrance  of  other  speakers  of  eminence  to 
my  contemplation,  their  several  faculties  and  endowments 
present  themselves  in  a  different  order,  according  to  the  pro- 
portions of  excellence  to  each  other  which  they  respectively 
bear.  In  thinking,  for  example,  of  Mr.  Fox,  the  torrent  of  his 
vehement  and  overwhelming  logic  is  first  before  me.  ...  If 
I  should  pass  to  his  celebrated  antagonist,  I  repose  upon  the 
majesty  of  his  amplification.     The  wit  of  Sheridan,*  the  bla- 

*  Richard  Brinsley  Sheridan,  bora  at  Dublin  in  1751,  died  in  London,  July 
7,  1816.  He  was  eminently  distinguished,  as  a  wit,  boon-companion,  orator, 
politician,  and  dramatist,  at  a  time  when  eminent  men  were  abundant.  He 
was  the  friend  of  Fox,  and  long  the  intimate  of  the  Prince  of  Wales.  Habits 
of  improvidence  and  extravagance  made  him  constantly  in  difficulties.  Intem- 
perate habits  ruined  his  health,  and  he  died,  broken  in  spirit,  and  in  great 
want.  His  wit  and  eloquence  were  remarkable.  Having  stated  that  he  never 
spoke  well  until  after  he  had  drank  a  couple  of  bottles  of  port,  Father  O'Leary 
said  "  this  was  like  a  porter;  he  could  not  get  on  without  a  load  on  his  head." 
When  he  wrote,  he  always  drank.  "  A  glass  of  wine,"  he  used  to  say,  "would 
encourage  the  bright  thought  to  come :  and  then  it  was  right  to  take  another  to 
reward  it  for  coming."  —  Moore's  Life  of  Sheridan.,  although  naturally  apologetic 
for  its  subject,  is  a  brilliant  record  of  a  brilliant  career.  Byron's  opinion  of 
Sheridan,  hastily  thrown  off  in  conversation,  was  this :  "  Whatever  Sheridan 
has  done  or  chosen  to  do  has  been  par  excellence,  always  the  best  of  its  kind. 
He  has  written  the  best  comedy  (School  for  Scandal),  the  best  opera  (the 
Duenna  —  in  my  mind  far  better  than  that  St.  Giles's  lampoon,  The  Beggar's 
Opera),  the  best  farce  (The  Critic  —  it  is  only  too  good  for  an  after-piece),  and 
the  best  address  (Monologue  on  Garrick),  and  to  crown  ail,  delivered  the  very 


LOUD   ERSKINE.  139 

zing  imagination  and  the  fantastic  drollery  of  Ourran,  the 
forensic  and  simple  vigor  of  Erskine,*  and  the  rapid,  versatile, 

best  oration  (the  famous  Reform  Speech),  ever  conceived  or  heard  in  this 
country."  When  Sheridan  heard  this  compliment,  shortly  before  his  death, 
he  burst  into  tears.  —  Moore's  own  tribute  of  the  same  date  was  less  compli- 
mentary. In  his  "  Two-Penny  Post-Bag',"  describing  a  fashionable  dinner  in 
London,  he  said : — 

"  The  brains  were  near  Sherry,  and  once  had  been  fine, 

But,  of  late,  they  had  lain  so  long  soaking  in  wine, 

That,  though  we,  from  courtesy,  still  choose  to  call 

These  brains  very  fine,  they  were  no  brains  at  all." 

Compare  this",  also,  with  Byron's  Monody  in  which  he  says  that  — 

"  Nature  formed  but  one  such  man, 

And  broke  the  die,  in  moulding  Sheridan," 

and  Moore's  own  later  mention  of  him  as  — 

"  The  pride  of  the  palace,  the  bower,  and  the  hall, 
The  orator  —  dramatist  —  minstrel  —  who  ran 
Through  each  mode  of  the  lyre,  and  was  master  of  all." — M. 
*  Thomas  Erskine,  third  son  of  the  Earl  of  Buchan,  a  Scottish  peer,  was 
born  in  1750.  After  serving  in  the  navy  and  the  army  he  went  to  the  bar  in 
1778.  Five  years  after  (which  was  unusually  rapid)  he  was  made  King's 
Counsel  —  a  rank  which  advances  the  status  of  him  who  receives  it.  In  the 
same  year  he  entered  Parliament.  As  an  advocate  (for  he  never  was  much  of 
a  lawyer)  he  obtained  great  practice  and  much  eminence.  In  politics  he  sided 
with  Fox,  and  thus  became  intimate  with  the  Prince  of  Wales,  who  made  him 
his  Attorney-General  —  a  post  which  he  lost  on  undertaking  the  defence  of 
Thomas  Paine,  in  1792,  when  prosecuted  for  publishing  "  The  Rights  of  Man." 
His  subequent  defence  of  Hardy,  Home  Tooke,  and  others,  charged  with  high 
treason,  and  his  vindication  of  the  rights  of  the  subject  and  the  liberty  of  the 
press,  made  him  extremely  popular.  His  pamphlet  on  the  War  with  France, 
ran  through  forty-eight  editions,  owing  to  his  name  alone,  for  it  was  not  well 
written.  In  1802,  he  resumed  his  official  connection  with  the  Prince  of  Wales, 
and,  in  1806,  on  Pitt's  death,  was  created  Lord  Erskine  and  made  Lord  Chan- 
cellor, but  had  to  resign  in  1807,  when  the  ministry  broke  up.  He  obtained  the 
usual  retiring  pension  of  four  thousand  pounds  sterling  a  year  (now  five  thou- 
sand pounds  sterling),  which  is  considered  a  right  in  England,  where  a  lawyer 
can  not  go  back  to  practice  at  the  bar  after  having  filled  the  office  of  judge. 
He  soon  sank  into  obscurity,  and  became  involved  in  debt.  Lord  Erskine  died 
in  1823.  He  had  no  success  in  Parliament,  where,  for  the  most  part,  hamsters 
accustomed  to  speak  to  the  -irray  of  judge,  jury,  and  counsel,  resemble  the  man 
spoken  of  by  Locke,  in  his  chapter  on  the  association  of  ideas,  who  having 
learned  to  dance  in  a  room  where  his  trunk  lay,  could  never  dance  afterward 
where  that  trunk  was  not  present  to  witness  his  agility.  Erskine  was  so  fond 
of  talking  of  himself  that  he  was  nick-named  and   caricatured  as  "  Counsellor 


14:0  CHATU/KS   KENDAL   BTTSHE. 

and  incessant  intensity,  of  Plunket  —  are  the  first  associations 
which  connect  themselves  with  their  respective  names.  But 
there  is  no  one  peculiar  faculty  of  mind  which  suggests  itself 
in  the  first  instance  as  the  characteristic  of  Mr.  Bushe,  and 
which  presses  into  the  van  of  his  qualifications  as  a  public 
speaker.  The  corporeal  image  of  the  man  himself  is  brought 
at  once  into  the  memory.  I  do  not  think  of  any  one  distin- 
guishing attribute  in  the  shape  of  a  single  intellectual  abstrac- 
tion—  it  is  a  picture  that  I  have  before  me. 

There  is  a  certain  rhetorical  heroism  in  the  expression  of 
his  countenance,  when  enlightened  and  inflamed,  which  I  have 
not  witnessed  in  the  faces  of  other  men.  The  phrase  may, 
perhaps,  appear  too  extravagant  and  Irish ;  but  those  who 
have  his  physiognomy  in  their  recollection,  will  not  think  that 
the  word  is  inapplicable.  The  complexion  is  too  sanguineous 
and  ruddy,  but  has  no  murkiness  or  impurity  in  its  flush  :  it  is 
indicative  of  great  fullness,  but,  at  the  same  time,  of  great 
vigor  of  temperament.  The  forehead  is  more  lofty  than  ex- 
pansive, and  suggests  itself  to  be  the  residence  of  an  elevated 
rather  than  of  a  comprehensive  mind.  It  is  not  so  much 
"  the  dome  of  thought,"  as  "the  palace  of  the  soul."  It  has 
none  of  the  deep  furrows  and  intellectual  indentures  which  are 
observable  in  the  forehead  of  Plunket,  but  is  smooth,  polished, 
and  marble.  The  eyes  are  large,  globular,  and  blue ;  ex- 
tremely animated  with  idea,  but  without  any  of  that  diffusive 
irradiation  which  belongs  to  the  expression  of  genius.  They 
are  filled  with  a. serene  light,  but  have  not  much  brilliancy  or 
fire.  The  mind  within  them  seems,  however,  to  be  all  activity 
and  life,  and  to  combine  a  singular  mixture  of  intensity  and 
deliberation.  The  nose  is  lightly  arched,  and  with  sufficient 
breadth  of  the  nostrils  (which  physiognomists  consider  as  a 
type  of  eloquence)  to  furnish   the  associations  of  daring  and 

Ego."  —  Once,  on  a  trial  of  a  patent  for  a  shoe-buckle,  he  exclaimed,  "How 
would  my  ancestors  have  looked  at  this  specimen  of  modern  dexterity?"  and 
went  on  to  laud  his  ancestors.  Mingay,  on  the  other  side  contemptuously  re- 
marked that  if  Erskine's  sans-culotte  ancestors  would  have  wondered  at  his 
shoe-buckle,  their  astonishment  would  have  been  yet  greater  at  —  his  shoes  an4 
stockings;  the  Scotch  Highlanders  wore  neither.  —  M. 


HIS    EXPKESSIVE    FACE.  141 

of  power,  and  terminates  with  a  delicacy  and  chiseled  elegance 
of  proportion,  in  which  it  is  easy  to  discover  the  polished  irony 
and  refined  satire  in  which  he  is  accustomed  to  indulge.  But 
the  mouth  is  the  most  remarkable  feature  in  his  countenance  : 
it  is  endowed  with  the  greatest  variety  of  sentiment,  and  con- 
tains a  rare  assemblage  of  oratorical  qualities.  It  is  charac- 
teristic of  force,  firmness,  and  precision,  and  is  at  once  affable 
and  commanding,  proud  and  kind,  tender  and  impassioned, 
accurate  and  vehement,  generous  and  sarcastic,  and  is  capable 
of  the  most  conciliating  softness  and  the  most  impetuous  ire. 
Yet  there  is  something  artificial  about  it,  from  a  lurking 
consciousness  of  its  own  expression.  Its  smile  is  the  great 
instrument  of  its  effects,  but  appears  to  be  too  systematic  : 
yet  it  is  susceptible  of  the  nicest  gradations.  It  merely  flashes 
and  disappears,  or,  in  practised  obedience  to  the  will,  streams 
over  the  whole  countenance  in  a  broad  and  permanent  illumin- 
ation :  at  one  moment  it  just  passes  over  the  lips,  and  dies  at 
the  instant  of  its  birth  ;  and  at  another,  bursts  out  into  an 
exuberant  and  overflowing  joyousness,  and  seems  caught,  in 
the  fullness  of  its  hilarity,  from  the  face  of  Oomus  himself. 
But  it  is  to  satire  that  it  is  principally  and  most  effectually  ap- 
plied. It  is  the  glitter  of  the  poisoned  sneer  that  is  leveled  at 
the  heart. 

The  man  who  is  gifted  with  these  powers  of  physiognomy 
is,  naturally  enough,  almost  too  prodigal  of  their  use :  and  a 
person  who  watched  Mr.  Bushe  would  perceive,  that  he  fre- 
quently employed  the  abundant  resources  of  his  countenance 
instead  of  the  riches  of  his  mind.  With  him,  indeed,  a  look 
is  often  sufficient  for  all  purposes.     It 

"Conveys  a  libel  in  a  frown, 
And  winks  a  reputation  down." 

There  is  a  gentleman  at  the  Irish  bar,  Mr.  Henry  Deane 
Grady,*  one  of  whose  eyes  he  has  himself  designated  as  "his 

*  Henry  Deane  Grady  was  a  barrister  of  some  celebrity  in  Ireland.  He  long 
had  a  large  income  as  one  tff  the  counsel  to  the  Irish  Commissioners  of  Cus- 
tom and  Excise,  and  retired  on  a  pension  of  two  thousand  pounds  sterling  a 
year.  He  had  what  O'Connell  used  to  call  "  a  swivel  eye,"  which  he  could 
bring  to  bear,  curiously  enough,  upon  a  jury.  His  wink,  it  was  declared  »aid 
a*  much  as  many  a  rival's  speech.  —  M. 


112  CHARLES    KENDAL    BUSHE. 

jury  eye ;"  and,  indeed,  from  bis  frequent  application  of  its 
ludicrous  qualifications,  wliicli  the  learned  gentleman  often 
substitutes  in  the  place  of  argument,  even  where  argument 
might  be  obviously  employed,  has  acquired  a  sort  of  profes- 
sional distortion,  of  which  he  appears  to  be  somewhat  singu- 
larly proud.  Mr.  Bushe  does  not,  it  is  true,  rely  so  much  upon 
this  species  of  ocular  logic ;  but  even  he,  with  all  his  good 
taste,  carries  it  to  an  extreme.  It  never  amounts  to  the  buf- 
foonery of  the  old  school  of  Irish  barristers,  who  were  addicted 
to  a  strange  compound  of  tragedy  and  farce ;  but  still  it  is 
vicious  from  its  excess. 

The  port  and  attitude  of  Mr.  Bushe  are  as  well  suited  to  the 
purposes  of  impressiveness  as  his  countenance  and  its  expres- 
sion. His  form,  indeed,  is  rather  too  corpulent  and  heavy,  and 
if  it  were  not  concealed  in  a  great  degree  by  his  gown,  would 
be  considered  ungainly  and  inelegant.  His  stature  is  not 
above  the  middle  size ;  but  his  chest  is  wide  and  expansive, 
and  lends  to  his  figure  an  aspect  of  sedateness  and  strength. 
In  describing  the  ablest  of  his  infernal  senate,  Milton  has 
particularly  mentioned  the  breadth  of  his  "Atlantean  shoul- 
ders." The  same  circumstance  is  specified  by  Homer  in  his 
picture  of  Ulysses  ;  and  however  many  speakers  of  eminence 
have  overcome  the  disadvantages  of  a  weak  and  slender  con- 
figuration, it  can  not  be  doubted  that  we  associate  with  dignity 
ami  wisdom  an  accompaniment  of  massiveness  and  power. 

His  gesture  is*of  the  first  order.  It  is  finished  and  rounded 
with  that  perfect  care,  which  the  orators  of  antiquity  bestowed 
upon  the  external  graces  of  eloquence,  and  is  an  illustration 
of  the  justice  of  the  observation  made  by  the  master  of  them 
all,  that  action  was  not  only  the  chief  ingredient,  but  almost 
the  exclusive  constituent,  of  excellence  in  his  miraculous  art. 
There  is  unquestionably  much  of  that  native  elegance  about 
it,  which  is  to  the  body  what  fancy  and  imagination  are  to  the 
mind,  and  which  no  efforts  of  the  most  laborious  diligence  can 
acquire.  But  the  heightening  and  additions  of  deep  study  are 
apparent.  The  most  minute  particulars  are  attended  to.  So 
far,  indeed,  has.  an  observance  of  effect  been  carried,  that,  in 
serious  obedience   to  the  ironical  precept  of  the  satirist,  he 


HIS   PC    ISHED   DELIVERY.  143 

wears  a  large  gold  ring,  which  is  frequently  and  ostentatiously 
displayed  upon  his  weighty  and  commanding  hand.  But  it  is 
the  voice  of  this  fine  speaker  which  contains  the  master-spell 
of  his  perfections.  I  have  already  mentioned  its  extraordinary 
attributes,  and,  indeed,  it  must  be  actually  heard  in  order  to 
form  any  appreciation  of  its  effects. 

It  must  be  acknowledged  by  the  admirers  of  Mr.  Bushe,  that 
his  delivery  constitutes  his  chief  merit  as  an  advocate,  for  his 
other  powers,  however  considerable,  do  not  keep  pace  with  it. 
His  style  and  diction  are  remarkably  conspicuous  and  clear, 
but  are  deficient  in  depth.  He  has  a  remarkable  facility  in 
the  use  of  simple  and  unelaborated  expression,  and  every  word 
drops  of  its  own  accord  into  that  part  of  the  sentence  to  which 
it  most  properly  belongs.  The  most  accurate  ear  could  not 
easily  detect  a  single  harshness,  or  one  inharmonious  concur- 
rence of  sounds,  in  the  course  of  his  longest  and  least  pre- 
meditated speech.  But,  at  the  same  time,  there  is  some  want 
of  power  in  his  phraseology,  which  is  not  either  very  original 
or  picturesque.  He  indulges  little  in  his  imagination,  from  a 
dread,  perhaps,  of  falling  into  those  errors  to  which  his  coun- 
trymen are  so  prone,  by  adventuring  upon  the  heights  which 
overhang  them.  But  I  am,  at  the  same  time,  inclined  to 
suspect  that  nature  has  not  conferred  that  faculty  in  great 
excellence  upon  him.  An  occasional  flush  gleams  for  a  mo- 
ment over  his  thoughts,  but  it  is  less  the  lightning  of  the 
imagination,  than  the  warm  exhalation  of  a  serene  and  mete- 
oric fancy.* 

Ourran,  with  all  his  imperfecti  >ns,  would  frequently  redeem 
the  obscurity  of  his  language,  by  a  single  expression  that 
threw  a  wide  and  piercing  illumination  far  around  him,  and 
left  a  track  of  splendor  upon  the  memory  of  his  audience 
which  was  slow  to  pass  away;  but,  if  Bushe  has  avoided  the 
defects  into  which   the   ambition   and  enthusiasm  of  Ourran 

*  Lord  Brougham,  who  did  not  make  Bushe's  acquaintance  until  1839,  when 
he  went  to  London  to  give  evidence  before  the  Irish  Committee  in  the  House 
of  Lords,  then  formed  the  very  high  opinion  of  him  which  he  expressed  in  hi» 
Statesmen.  He  said,  "  all  that  one  had  heard  of  the  wonderful  fascination  ot 
his  manner,  both  at  the  bar  and  upon  the  bench,  became  easily  credible  to  those 
who  heard  his  evidence." — M. 


14:4:  CHARLES    KENDAL    BUSHE. 

were  accustomed  to  hurry  him,  he  has  not  approached  him  in 
richness  of  diction,  or  in  that  elevation  of  thought  to  which 
that  great  speaker  had  the  power  of  raising  his  hearers  with 
himself.  He  was  often  "  led  astray,"  but  it  was  "  by  light 
from  Heaven."  On  the  other  hand,  the  more  level  and  sub- 
dued cast  of  thinking  and  of  phrase,  which  have  been  adopted 
by  Mr.  Bushe,  are  better  suited  to  cases  of  daily  occurrence ; 
and  I  own  that  I  should  prefer  him  for  my  advocate,  in  any 
transaction  which  required  the  art  of  exposition,  and  the 
elucidating  quality  which  is  so  important  in  the  conduct  of 
ordinary  affairs.  He  has  the  power  of  simplifying  in  the 
highest  degree.  He  evolves,  with  a  surprising  facility,  the 
most  intricate  facts  from  the  most  embarrassing  complication, 
and  reduces,  in  a  moment,  a  chaotic  heap  of  incongruous 
materials  into  symmetry  and  order.  In  what  is  called  "  the 
narration"  in  discourses  upon  rhetoric,  his  talent  is  of  the  first 
rank.  He  clarifies  and  methodises  every  topic  upon  which  he 
dwells,  and  makes  the  obscurest  subject  perspicuous  and  trans- 
parent to  the  dullest  mind. 

His  wit  is  perfectly  gentlemanlike  and  pure.*  It  is  not  so 
vehement  and  sarcastic  as  that  of  Plunket,  nor  does  it  grope 
for  pearls,  like  the  imagination  of  Ourran,  in  the  midst  of  foul- 
ness and  ordure.  It  is  full  of  smooth  mockery  and  playfulness, 
and  dallies  with  its  victim  with  a  sort  of  feline  elegance  and 
grace.  But  its  gripe  is  not  the  less  deadly  for  its  procrasti- 
nation. His  wit  has  more  of  the  qualities  of  raillery  than  of 
imagination.  He  does  not  accumulate  grotesque  images  to- 
gether, or  surprise  by  the  distance  of  the  objects  between  which 
he  discovers  an  analogy.  He  has  nothing  of  that  spirit  of 
whim  which  pervaded  the  oratory  of  Curran,  and  made  his 
mind  appear  at  moments  like  a  transmigration  of  Hogarth. 
Were  a  grossly  ludicrous  similitude  to  offer  itself  to  him,  he 
would  at  once  discard  it  as  incompatible  with  that  chastised 

*  His  conversation  merited  Brougham's  eulogy  that  "  nothing  could  be  more 
delightful."  His  wit  came  without  effort.  Once,  when  two  bishops  declared 
that,  in  choosing  the  officers  of  the  Ecclesiastical  Board,  they  must  vote  for  the 
nominees  of  the  minister,  to  whom  they  owed  their  mitres,  Bushe  sent  a  slip 
to  Plunket,  "  It  is  he  that  hath  made  us  and  not  we  ourselves:  we  are  hii 
people,  and  the  sheep  of  his  pasture." — M, 


HIS   EAST   AND   EVEN   STYLE.  14:5 

and  subjugated  ridicule  in  which  alone  he  permits  himself  to 
indulge. 

But  from  this  circumstance  he  draws  a  considerable  advan- 
tage. The  mirth  of  Ourran  was  so  broad,  and  the  convulsion 
of  laughter,  which  by  his  personations  (for  his  delivery  often 
bordered  upon  a  theatrical  audacity)  he  never  failed,  when- 
ever he  thought  proper,  to  produce,  disqualified  his  auditors 
and  himself  for  the  more  sober  investigations  of  truth.  His 
transitions,  therefore,  were  frequently  too  abrupt ;  and  with 
all  his  mastery  over  his  art,  and  that  Protean  quality  by  which 
he  passed  with  an  astonishing  and  almost  divine  facility  into 
every  different  modification  of  style  and  thought,  a  just  gra- 
dation from  the  extravagance  of  merriment  to  the  depth  of 
pathetic  emotion  could  not  always  be  preserved.  Bushe,  on 
the  other  hand,  never  finds  it  difficult  to  recover  himself. 
Whenever  he  deviates  from  that  sobriety  which  becomes  the 
discussions  of  a  court  of  justice,  he  retraces  his  steps  and  re- 
turns to  seriousness  again,  not  only  with  perfect  ease,  but  with- 
out even  leaving  a  perception  of  the  change.  His  manner  is 
admirably  chequered,  and  the  various  topics  which  he  employs, 
enter  into  each  other  by  such  gentle  and  elegant  degrees,  that 
all  the  parts  of  his  speech  bear  a  just  relation,  and  are  as  well 
proportioned  as  the  several  limbs  of  a  fine  statue  to  the  gene- 
ral composition  of  the  whole.  This  unity,  which  in  all  the  arts 
rests  upon  the  same  sound  principles,  is  one  of  the  chief  merits 
of  Mr.  Bushe  as  a  public  speaker. 

There  is  a  fine  natural  vein  of  generous  sentiment  running 
through  his  oratory.  It  has  often  been  said  that  true  elo- 
quence could  not  exist  in  the  absence  of  good  moral  qualities. 
In  opposition  to  this  maxim  of  ethical  criticism,  the  example 
of  some  highly-gifted  but  vicious  men  has  been  appealed  to ; 
but  it  must  be  remembered,  in  the  first  place,  that  most  of 
those  whose  deviations  from  good  conduct  are  considered  to 
afford  a  practical  refutation  of  this  tenet  (which  was  laid  down 
by  the  greatest  orator  of  antiquity)  Avere  not  engaged  in  the 
discussion  of  private  concerns,  in  which,  generally  speaking, 
an  appeal  to  moral  feeling  is  of  most  frequent  occurrence ;  and 
in  the  next  place,  there  can  be  little  doubt,  that  although  .a 

Vot..T,—7 


J  46  CHARLES   KENDAL   BUSHE. 

series  of  vicious  indulgences  may  have  adulterated  tlieir  na- 
tures, they  must  have  been  endowed  with  a  large  portion  of 
generous  instinct.  However  their  moral  vision  might  have 
been  gradually  obscured,  they  could  not  have  been  born  blind 
to  that  sacred  light  which  they  knew  how  to  describe  so  well. 
Nay,  more:  I  will  venture  to  affirm,  that,  in  their  moments  of 
oratorical  enthusiasm,  they  must  have  been  virtuous  men. 

As  the  best  amongst  us  fall  into  occasional  error,  so  in  the 
spirit  of  lenity  to  that  human  nature  to  which  we  ourselves 
belong,  we  should  cherish  the  hope  that  there  are  few  indeed 
t.'O  bad,  as  not  in  imagination  at  least  to  relapse  at  intervals  to 
better  sentiment  and  a  nobler  cast  of  thought.  However  the 
fountains  of  the  heart  may  have  been  dried  and  parched  up, 
enough  must  at  least  remain  to  show  that  there  had  been  a 
living  spring  within  them.  At  all  events  there  can  be  no  elo- 
quence without  such  an  imitation  of  virtue,  as  to  look  as  beau- 
tiful as  the  original  from  which  the  copy  is  made.  Mr.  Bushe, 
I  confidently  believe,  bears  the  image  stamped  upon  his  breast, 
and  lias  only  to  feel  there,  in  order  to  give  utterance  to  those 
sentiments  which  give  a  moral  dignity  and  elevation  to  his 
speeches.  His  whole  life,  at  least,  is  in  keeping  with  his  ora- 
tory ;*  and  any  one  who  heard  him  would  be  justly  satisfied  that 

*  Charles  Kendal  Bushe,  horn  in  January,  1767,  at  Kilmurry  (the  ancient 
seat  of  his  family,  which  he  eventually  repurchased  after  the  extravagance  of 
his  relatives  had  lost  it),  entered  Trinity  College,  Dublin,  in  1782  —  the  year 
of  Ireland's  independence.  He  soon  became  one  of  the  most  eloquent  deba- 
ters in  the  Historical  Society,  where  he  had  Plunket  as  a  rival.  At  that  time, 
the  gallery  of  the  Irish  House  of  Commons  was  open  to  the  University  students, 
provided  they  wore  their  academic  attire.  Bushe  was  a  constant  attendant  in 
that  great  school  for  orators.  In  1793,  he  was  called  to  the  bar,  and  speedily 
succeeded  there.  In  1799,  he  entered  Parliament,  where  he  was  second  only 
to  Plunket  in  opposing  the  Union.  In  1805,  he  had  reached  such  a  station  at 
tae  bar,  as  to  justify  his  being  made  one  of  the  King's  Sergeants,  and  in  the 
same  year,  Lord  Hardwicke  being  Viceroy,  was  appointed  Solicitor-General. 
This  was  a  concession  to  the  liberal  cause,  for  Bushe  was  known  to  be  friendly 
to  Catholic  Emancipation,  though,  after  the  Union,  he  had  taken  no  part  in 
^politics.  He  continued  in  his  office  under  "All  the  Talents"  Ministry  of  1806-'7, 
and  was  retained  in  that  office,  under  successive  administrations,  until  early  in 
1822,  when  Saurin,  put  over  his  head  in  1807,  as  Attorney-General,  waived 
Ibis  claims  to  the  Chief  Justiceship,  on  Downes'  retirement,  and  Bushe  was  ap- 
pointed.    As  a  judge,  Bushe  gave  general  satisfaction,  for  more   than   twents 


LORD    CLONCURRY's    CASE.  147 

he  had  been  listening  to  a  high-minded,  amiable,  and  honora- 
ble man. 

The  following  extract  from  one  of  his  best  speeches  will 
illustrate  the  quality  to  which  I  have  alluded,  as  well  as  fur- 
nish a  favorable  example  of  the  general  tone  of  his  eloquence.* 
He  is  describing  the  forgiveness  of  a  husband  ;  and,  as  this 
article  has  already  exceeded  the  bounds  which  I  had  prescrib- 
ed to  myself,  I  shall  conclude  with  it:  "It  requires  obdurate 
and  habitual  vice  and  practised  depravity  to  overbear  the  nat- 
ural workings  of  the  human  heart :  this  unfortunate  woman 
had  not  strength  farther  to  resist.  She  had  been  seduced,  she 
had  been  depraved,  her  soul  was  burdened  with  a  guilty  se- 
cret;  but  she  was  young  in  crime  and  true  to  nature.  She 
could  no  longer  bear  the  load  of  her  own  conscience  —  she  was 

years  while  he  held  that  office.  As  an  advocate  at  Nisi  Prius,  few  men  won 
more  verdicts.  He  had  tact  for  which  Scarlett  was  eminent,  at  the  English 
bar,  but  he  also  had  genius,  eloquence,  and  wit,  which  Scarlett  had  not.  His 
manner  has  already  been  noticed  ;  John  Kemble  called  him  "  the  most  perfect 
actor  off  the  stage."  As  a  forensic  speaker,  clearness  of  statement  was  his 
great  merit.  —  Bushe  manned  the  sister  of  Sir  Philip  Crampton,  the  Surgeon 
General  of  Ireland  and  father  of  the  present  British  Minister  at  Washington. 
He  was  offered  a  peerage  and  declined  it.  —  In  1842,  he  retired  frem  the  bench, 
on  a  pension  of  three  thousand  pounds  sterling  a  year.  He  died,  at  his  son's 
seat  near  Dublin,  on  July  7,  1843. —  M. 

*  The  nobleman  was  Lord  Cloncurry,  and  his  guilty  wife,  from  whom  he 
was  divorced,  was  daughter  of  General  Morgan.  Lord  Cloncurry  was  born 
in  August,  1773,  and  died  at  Blackrock,  near  Dublin,  October,  1853.  He 
enteied  early  into  public  affairs,  and  was  mixed  up  with  them  tor  more  than 
half  a  century.  He  was  educated  at  Oxford,  and  joined  the  United  Irishmen, 
on  his  return.  The  Emmetts,  Sampson,  and  O'Coimor,  were  his  close  friends. 
He  established  a  branch  of  the  united  body  in  Loudon,  was  suspected  by  the 
Government,  arrested,  and  examined  before  the  Privy  Council,  when  he  ad- 
mitted that  he  was  a  member  of  the  society.  He  was  cautioned  and  discharged, 
but  was  again  apprehended,  committed  to  the  Tower,  and  detained  there  for 
two  years.  From  that  time  he  was  a  staunch  Liberal,  and,  though  a  Protes- 
tant, the  earnest  advocate  of  the  Catholic  Claims.  He  was  O'Connell's  per- 
sonal friend  and  admirer  —  though  he  did  not  go  quite  to  the  same  extent  in 
politics.  The  Whig  Ministry  gave  him  an  English  Peerage.  A  few  years 
ago,  he  published  his  Recollections  —  full  of  anecdotes,  and  written  with  great 
clearness.  He  bequeathed  a  handsome  legacy  to  the  Dublin  Library  —  provi- 
ded it  assume  the  more  national  name  of  the  Hibernian  Athenaeum.  Cecil 
Lawless,  his  youngest  son,  avowed  himself  a  Repealer,  in  1846,  when  he  w».| 
made  member  for  Clonmel.  —  M. 


148  CHARLES    KENDAL    BITSHE. 

overpowered  by  the  generosity  of  an  injured  husband,  more 
keen  than  any  reproaches  —  she  was  incapacitated  from  any 
further  dissimulation;  she  flung  herself  at  his  feet.  'I  am 
unworthy,'  she  exclaimed,  '  of  such  tenderness  and  such  good- 
ness—  it  is  too  late  —  the  villain  has  ruined  me  and  dishonored 
vou :  I  am  guilty.'  —  Gentlemen,  I  told  you  I  should  confine 
myself  to  facts ;  I  have  scarcely  made  an  observation.  I  will 
not  affront  my  client's  case,  nor  your  feelings,  nor  my  own,  by 
common-placing  upon  the  topic  of  the  plaintiff's  sufferings. 
You  are  Christians,  men;  your  hearts  must  describe  for  me; 
I  can  not  —  I  affect  not  humility  in  saying  that  I  can  not  — 
no  advocate  can;  —  as  I  told  you,  your  hearts  must  be  the  ad- 
vocates. Conceive  this  unhappy  nobleman  in  the  bloom  of 
life,  surrounded  with  every  comfort,  exalted  with  high  honors 
and  distinctions,  enjoying  great  property,  the  proud  proprietor, 
a  {ew  hours  before,  of  what  he  thought  an  innocent  and  an 
amiable  woman,  the  happy  father  of  children  whom  he  loved, 
and  loved  the  more  as  the  children  of  a  wife  whom  he  adored 
—  precipitated  in  one  hour  into  an  abyss  of  misery  which  no 
language  can  represent,  loathing  his  rank,  despising  his  wealth, 
cursing  the  youth  and  health  that  promised  nothing  but  the 
protraction  of  a  wretched  existence,  looking  round  upon  every 
worldly  object  with  disgust  and  despair,  and  finding  in  this 
complicated  wo  no  principle  of  consolation,  except  the  con- 
sciousness of  not  having  deserved  it.  Smote  to  the  earth  this 
unhappy  man  forgot  not  his  character;  —  he  raised  the  guilty 
and  lost  penitent  from  his  feet;  he  left  her  punishment  to  her 
conscience  and  to  Heaven ;  her  pardon  he  reserved  to  himself. 
The  tenderness  and  generosity  of  his  nature  prompted  him  to 
instant  mercy  —  he  forgave  her — he  prayed  to  God  to  forgive 
her;  he  told  her  that  she  should  be  restored  to  the  protection 
of  her  father;  that  until  then  her  secret  should  be  preserved 
and  her  feelings  respected,  and  that  her  fall  from  honor  should 
be  as  easy  as  it  might;  but  there  was  a  forgiveness  for  which 
she  supplicated,  and  which  he  sternly  refused ;  he  refused 
that  forgiveness  which  implies  the  meanness  of  the  person  who 
dispenses  it,  and  which  renders  the  clemency  valueless  because 
it  makes  the  man  despicable ;  he  refused  to  take  back  to  bi? 


StS    PROMOTION.  149 

arms  the  tainted  and  faithless  woman  who  had  betrayed  him ; 
he  refused  to  expose  himself  to  the  scorn  of  the  world  and  his 
own  contempt; — he  submitted  to  misery;  he  could  not  brook 
dishonor."* 

*  Since  the  above  article  was  written  [it  was  published  in  October  1822], 
Mr.  Bushe  has  been  raised  to  the  office  of  Chief  Justice  of  the  King's  Bemh, 
in  consequence  of  the  resignation  of  Mr.  Downes,  who  has  at  last  proved  hirn 
self  possessed  of  the  Christian  virtue  which  Mr.  Bushe  used  to  say  was  the 
only  one  he  wanted. 


WILLIAM   SAURIN. 

Mr.  Saurin  is  the  son  of  a  Presbyterian  clergyman,  who  fol- 
lowed the  duties  of  his  pious  but  humble  calling  in  the  north 
of  Ireland.  His  grandfather  was  a  French  Protestant,  who, 
after  the  revocation  of  the  edict  of  Nantz,  sought  an  asylum  in 
Ireland.  He  is  said  to  have  belonged  to  the  family  of  the  cel- 
ebrated preacher  of  his  name.*  Mr.  Saurin  was  educated  in 
the  University  of  Dublin.  It  does  not  appear  that  he  was  dis- 
tinguished by  any  signal  proficiency,  either  in  literature  or  in 
science.  A  collegiate  reputation  is  not  a  necessary  precursor 
to  professional  success.  He  was  called  to  the  bar  in  the  year 
1780.  His  progress  was  slow,  and  for  thirteen  years  he  re- 
mained almost  unknown.  Conscious  of  his  secret  merits,  he 
was  not  disheartened,  and  employed  that  interval  in  accumu- 
lating the  stores  of  legal  knowledge.  He  had  few  qualities, 
indeed,  which  were  calculated  to  bring  him  into  instantaneous 
notice.  He  wrought  his  way  with  an  obscure  diligence,  and, 
indeed,  it  was  necessary  that  he  should  attain  the  light  by  a 
long  process  of  exfodation. 

To  this  day,  there  is  too  frequent  an  exhibition  of  boister- 
ous ability  at  the  Irish  bar;  but  in  the  olden  time,  the  qualifi- 

*  William  Saurin,  born  in  1757,  was  called  to  the  Irish  bar  in  1780,  received 
a  patent  of  precedence  (immediately  after  the  Prime  Sergeant,  Attorney  and 
Solicitor  General)  in  July,  1798,  was  made  Attorney-General  in  May,  1807,  and 
retained  tbat  office  until  January,  1822,  when  Mr.  Plunket  succeeded  him.  It 
was  expected,  from  his  high  attainments,  and  the  return  of  his  party  to  office, 
that  he  would  have  succeeded  Sir  Anthony  Hart,  as  Chancellor,  in  1830.  Mr. 
Saurin,  although  a  strong  political  partisan,  had  many  personal  friends,  even 
umong  his  opponents.  His  honor,  honesty,  and  ability,  were  unimpeached 
He  died  in  Dublin,  in  February,  .1839,  in  his  eighty-third  year.  —  M. 


LORD    CLONMEL.  iSl 

Cations  of  a  lawyer  were  measured  in  a  great  degree  by  his 
powers  of  vociferation.  Mr.  Saurin  was  imperfectly  versed  in 
the  stentorian  logic  which  prevailed  in  the  roar  of  Irish  nisi 
prius  ;  neither  had  he  the  matchless  imperturbability  of  front, 
to  which  the  late  Lord  Clonmel*  was  indebted  for  his  brazen 

*  John  Scott,  who  eventually  became  Eail  of  Clonmel,  Chief-Justice  of  Ire- 
land, was  born  in  June,  1739.  His  parents  were  in  a  very  humble  rank  of  life. 
While  at  school,  he  rendered  some  small  service  to  young  (afterward  Lord) 
Carleton,  whose  father  went  to  the  expense  of  sending  him  to  college,  and 
of  his  call  to  the  Irish  bar.  He  speedily  rose  to  eminence,  and  entered  the 
Irish  Parliament  on  the  recommendation  of  Lord  Lifford,  then  Chancellor.  In 
1774  he  was  made  Solicitor,  and  in  1777  Attorney-General,  which  he  remained 
iint.il  1782.  He  was  made  Chief-Justice  of  the  King's  Bench  in  1784  —  with 
which  office  he  also  held  the  rich  sinecure  of  Clerk  of  the  Pleas  in  the  Court 
of  Exchequer  —  and  was  created  an  Irish  peer,  as  Baron  Erlsfort.  In  1789,  he 
was  made  Viscount  Clonmel,  and  was  further  advanced  to  an  Earldom  in  1793. 
He  died  in  May,  1798,  leaving  a  fortune  of  twenty-two  thousand  pounds  ster- 
ling a  year.  —  This  man,  whose  talents  were  great,  may  be  said  to  have  got  on 
by  sheer  impudence  and  bullying.  He  knew  the  world  well,  and  how  to  play 
his  cards  in  it.  Where  argument  would  not  succeed,  he  endeavored  to  defeat 
his  opponent  by  duelling.  Among  others,  he  fought  with  Curran.  He  was 
master  of  sarcasm  and  ridicule,  and  unscrupulous  in  their  use.  Li  private  life, 
he  was  amiable,  witty,  and  agreeable ;  full  of  anecdote,  indelicate  and  coarse, 
but  amusing.  On  the  bench  he  was  overbearing,  particularly  to  Curran,  his  old 
opponent.  Having  publicly  insulted  Mr.  Hackett,  one  of  their  body,  the  bar 
held  a  meeting,  at  which  they  resolved,  with  only  one  dissentient  voice,  "  that 
until  his  Lordship  publicly  apologized,  no  barrister  would  either  take  a  brief, 
appear  in  the  King's  Bench,  or  sign  any  pleadings  for  that  Court."  Accord- 
ingly, when  the  Judges  sat,  neither  counsel  nor  attorneys  were  to  be  seen.  The 
result  was,  that  the  Chief-Justice,  Lord  Clonmel,  published  an  apology  in  the 
newspapers,  which  was  adroitly  dated  as  if  written  on  the  evening  of  the  offence, 
and  before  the  meeting  of  the  bar,  therefore  voluntary.  Some  time  befoi*e  he 
died,  a  report  of  his  illness  got  out.  "  Do  you  believe  it?''  said  some  one  to 
Curran.  The  reply  was,  "  I  believe  that  he  is  scoundrel  enough  to  live  or  die, 
just  as  it  suits  his  own  convenience."  His  personal  appearance  was  remarkable. 
He  had  an  immense  hanging  pair  of  cheeks  —  vulgarly  called  jowls  —  and  a 
huge  treble  chin,  to  correspond.  Looking  back,  toward  the  close  of  his  politi- 
cal career,  as  behooves  all  men  to  do  as  they  pass  into  the  shadows  of  the  valo 
of  life,  Lord  Clonmel  is  said  to  have  remarked,  "As  to  myself,  if  I  were  to 
begin  life  again,  I  would  rather  be  a  chimney-sweeper  than  connected  with  tha 
Irish  Government."  Two  of  Lord  Clonmel's  maxims  are  worthy  of  being  re- 
membered One  was,  "  Whatever  may  be  done  in  the  course  of  the  week, 
always  do  on  Monday  morning."  The  other,  which  he  gave  as  applicable  tC 
married  life,  was  —  "  Never  do  anything  for  peace-sake  :   if  you  do,  you  buy  all 


152  WILLIAM   SAXTRltt. 

coronet ;  but  his  substantial  deserts  were  sure  to  appear  at  last* 
If  he  could  not  fly,  he  had  the  strength  and  the  tenacity  requi- 
site to  climb.  His  rivals  were  engaged  in  the  pursuit  of  politi- 
cal distinction  and  oratorical  renown ;  all  his  labors,  as  well 
as  his  predilections,  were  confined  to  his  profession.  While 
others  were  indulging  in  legislative  meditations,  he  was  buried 
in  the  common  law.  An  acute  observer  would  have  seen  in 
his  unostentatious  assiduity  the  omen  of  a  tardy  but  secure 
success.  A  splendid  intellect  will,  in  all  likelihood,  ascend  to 
permanent  eminence,  but  the  odds  of  good  fortune  are  in  favor 
of  the  less  conspicuous  faculties. 

Plunket  and  Saurin  have  risen  to  an  equality  in  professional 
distinction;  but,  when  they  both  commenced  their  career,  upon 
a  sober  calculation,  the  chances  would  have  been  found,  I  think, 
upon  the  side  of  the  latter.  Like  the  slow  camel  and  the  Ara- 
bian courser,  both  may  be  fitted  to  the  desert ;  and,  although 
the  more  aspiring  and  fleeter  spirit  may  traverse  in  a  shorter 
period  the  waste  of  hardships  and  discouragement  which  lies 
between  it  and  success,  while,  with  all  its  swiftness  and  alac- 
rity, it  requires  an  occasional  relief  from  some  external  source 
of  refreshment  and  of  hope  :  yet,  bearing  its  restoratives  in  it- 
self, the  more  slow  and  persevering  mind  pursues  its  progress 
with  an  unabated  constancy,  and  often  leaves  its  more  rapid 
but  less  enduring  competitor  drooping  far  behind,  and  exhausted 
by  the  labors  of  its  desolate  and  arid  course. 

After  many  years  of  disappointment,  perhaps,  but  not  of 
despondency,  Mr.  Saurin's  name  began  to  be  whispered  in  the 
Hall.  The  little  business  with  which  he  had  been  intrusted 
was  discharged  with  such  efficiency,  that  he  gradually  acquired 
a  reputation  for  practical  utility  among  the  attorneys  of  the 
north.  Many  traits  of  the  Scotch  character  are  observable  in 
the  Presbyterian  colony  which  was  established  in  that  part  of 
Ireland ;  and  their  mutuality  of  support  is  among  the  honora- 
ble peculiarities  which  mark  their  origin  from  that  patriotic 
and  self-sustaining  people.     They  may  be  said  to  advance  un- 

future  tranquillity  only  by  concession."  When  asked  if  this  last  were  his  own 
rule  of  practice,  he  confessed  that  it  was  not,  as  a  philosopher  had  an  easier 
life  of  it  than  a  soldier !  —  M. 


HIS   BUSINESS   HABITS.  153 

cler  a  testudo.  It  is  remarked  at  the  Irish  bar  that  a  northern 
attorney  seldom  employs  a  southern  advocate.  Mr.  Saurin, 
though  descended  from  a  Gallic  progenitor,  had,  I  believe,  some 
auspicious  mixture  of  Caledonian  blood  (with  a  French  face, 
he  has  a  good  deal  of  the  Scotchman  in  his  character) ;  and 
that  circumstance,  together  with  the  locality  of  his  birth,  gave 
him  claims  to  the  patronage  of  the  attorneys  of  his  circuit. 
Those  arbiters  of  fortune  recognised  his  merits.  It  was  soon 
perceived  by  these  sagacious  persons  that  a  good  argument  is 
more  valuable  than  a  flower  of  speech,  and  that  the  lawyer  who 
nonsuits  the  plaintiff  is  as  efficacious  as  the  advocate  who  draws 
tears  from  the  jury. 

Mr.  Saurin's  habits  of  despatch  were  also  a  signal  recom- 
mendation. To  this  day,  under  a  pressure  of  various  occu- 
pancy, he  is  distinguished  for  a  regularity  and  promptitude, 
which  are  not  often  to  be  found  among  the  attributes  of  the 
leading  members  of  the  Irish  Bar.  Most,  indeed,  of  their  more 
eminent  advocates  are  "  illustrious  diners-out."  It  is  provo- 
king to  see  the  fortunes  of  men  hanging  in  miserable  suspense 
upon  their  convivial  procrastinations.  Mr.  Saurin  still  presents 
an  exemplary  contrast  to  these  dilatory  habits ;  and  it  is 
greatly  creditable  to  him  that  he  should  persevere,  from  a 
sense  of  duty  in  a  practice  which  was  originally  adopted  as  a 
means  of  success. 

The  first  occasion  on  which  he  appears  to  have  grown  into 
general  notice,  was  afforded  at  a  contested  election.  At  that 
period,  which  was  about  sixteen  years  after  he  had  been  called 
to  the  bar,  a  lawyer  at  an  Irish  election  was  almost  a  gladiator 
by  profession ;  his  pistols  were  the  chief  implements  of  reason- 
ing to  which  he  thought  it  necessary  to  resort.  "  Ratio 
ultima,"  the  motto  which  the  great  Frederick  caused  to  be 
engraven  upon  his  cannon,*  would  not  have  been  an  inappro- 

*  George  III.  presented  "  the  Great  Lord  Clive"  (as  he  is  called,  to  distin- 
guish him  from  the  small-minded  inheritors  of  his  title)  with  one  of  the  cannon 
which  had  been  captured,  by  Lord  C,  in  the  Indian  wars.  This  piece  of  ord- 
nance, which  remains  at  Powis  Castle,  in  Wales  (the  seat  of  the  Clive  family), 
has  engraven  on  it  an  inscription,  stating  the  donor's  name,  but  the  sentence 
"  Ultima  ratio  regum''  (the  last  argument  of  Kings)  is  certainly  a  curious  motto 
on  a  royal  gift.  —  M. 

7* 


154  WILLIAM   SAURIN. 

priate  designation  of  the  conclusive  arguments  which  werd 
then  so  much  in  use  in  Hibernian  dialectics.  I  am  not  aware, 
that  Mr.  Saurin  Avas  ever  accounted  an  eminent  professor  in 
this  school  of  logic:  upon  this  occasion,  however,  he  distin- 
guished himself  by  qualifications  very  distinct  from  the  bar- 
barous accomplishments  which  bring  intellect  and  dullness  to 
such  a  disastrous  level.  His  extensive  and  applicable  knowl- 
edge, his  dispassionate  perspicuity,  and  minute  precision,  won 
him  a  concurrence  of  applause.  He  became  known  upon  his 
circuit,  and  his  fame  soon  after  extended  itself  to  the  metropo- 
lis. His  progress  was  as  swiftly  accelerated  as  it  had  pre- 
viously been  slow :  every  occasion  on  which  he  was  employed 
furnished  a  new  vent  to  his  accumulated  information.  He  was 
at  length  fairly  launched ;  and  when  once  detached  from  the 
heavy  incumbrances  in  which  he  had  been  involved,  he  made 
a  rapid  and  conspicuous  way ;  and  it  was  soon  perceived  that 
he  could  carry  more  sail  than  gilded  galliots  which  had  started 
upon  the  full  flood  of  popularity  before  him.  He  soon  passed 
them  by,  and  rode  at  last  in  that  security  which  most  of  them 
were  never  destined  to  attain. 

In  the  year  1798,  Mr.  Saurin  was  at  the  head  of  his  profes- 
sion, and  was  not  only  eminent  for  his  talents,  but  added  to 
their  influence  the  weight  of  a  high  moral  estimation.  The 
political  disasters  of  the  country  furnished  evidence  of  the 
high  respect  in  which  he  was  held  by  the  members  of  his  own 
body.  The  Rebellion  broke  out,  and  the  genius  of  loyalty 
martialized  the  various  classes  of  the  community.  The  good 
citizens  of  Dublin  were  submitted  to  a  somewhat  fantastic 
metamorphosis  :  the  Grilpins  of  the  metropolis,  to  the  delighted 
wonder  of  their  wives  and  daughters,  were  travestied  into 
scarlet,  and  strutted,  in  grim  importance  and  ferocious  security, 
in  the  uneasy  accoutrements  of  a  bloodless  warfare. 

The  love  of  glory  became  contagious,  and  the  attorneys, 
solicitors,  and  six-clerks,  felt  the  intense  novelty  of  its  charms. 
The  Bar  could  not  fail  to  participate  in  the  ecstasy  of  patriot- 
ism :  the  boast  of  Cicero  became  inverted  in  this  access  of 
forensic  soldiership,  and  every  Drances,  "  loud  in  debate  and 
bold  in  peaceful   council,"  was  suddenly  transformed  into  a 


•Me  lawyer's  yeomanry  corps.  155 

warrior.  The  "  toged  counsel"  exhibited  a  spectacle  at  once 
ludicrous  and  lamentable ;  Justice  was  stripped  of  her  august 
ceremony  and  her  reverend  forms,  and  joining  in  this  grand 
political  masquerade,  attired  herself  in  the  garb,  and  feebly 
imitated  the  aspect  of  Bellona.  The  ordinary  business  of  the 
courts  of  law  was  discharged  by  barristers  in  regimentals ;  the 
plume  nodded  over  the  green  spectacle  —  the  bag  was  trans- 
muted in  the  cartridge-pouch  —  the  flowing  and  full-bottomed 
wig  was  exchanged  for  the  casque ;  the  chest,  which  years  of 
study  had  bent  into  a  professional  stoop,  was  straightened  in 
a  stiff  imprisonment  of  red  ;  the  flexible  neck,  which  had  been 
stretched  in  the  distension  of  vituperative  harangue,  was  en- 
closed in  a  high  and  rigid  collar.  The  disputatious  and  dingy 
features  of  every  minute  and  withered  sophist  were  swollen 
into  an  unnatural  bigness  and  burliness  of  look ;  the  strut  of 
the  mercenary  Hessian,*  who  realized  the  beau  ideal  of  martial 
ferocity,  was  mimicked  in  the  slouching  gait  which  had  been 
acquired  by  years  of  unoccupied  perambulation  in  the  Hall ; 
limbs,  habituated  to  yielding  silk,  were  locked  in  buff;  the 
reveille  superseded  the  shrill  voice  of  the  crier — the  disquisi- 
tions of  pleaders  were  "horribly  stuffed  with  epithets  of  war;" 
the  bayonet  lay  beside  the  pen,  and  the  musket  was  collateral 
to  the  brief. 

Yet,  with  all  this  innovation  upon  their  ordinary  habits,  the 
Bar  could  not  pass  all  at  once  into  a  total  desuetude  of  their 
more  natural  tendencies,  and  exhibited  a  relapse  into  their 
professional  predilections  in  the  choice  of  their  leader.  The 
athletic  nobleness  of  figure  for  which  Mr.  Magrath,f  for  in- 

*  The  Hessians  were  troops  from  Germany,  brought  into  Ireland  with  some 
Scotch  fencible  regiments,  in  1798  —  probably  because  the  Government  doubted 
wnether  the  regular  troops,  half  of  whom  were  Irish,  would  fight  against  their 
countrymen  in  the  field.  A  story  is  told  of  one  of  the  "rebels"  who  killed  a 
couple  of  Hessians,  and  was  putting  the  contents  of  their  pockets  into  his  own. 
A  friend  of  his  saw  the  conquest,  and  prayed  hard  to  have  one  of  the  captures. 
"  No,"  said  the  conqueror,  "  go  and  kill  a  Hessian  for  yourself  !"  The  saying 
\as  passed  into  a  proverb  in  Ireland.  —  M. 

t  Counsellor  Magrath  rejoiced  in  such  longitudinal  proportions,  that  he  was 
jal-ed  the  mathematical  definition,  "  Length  without  breadth."  As  he  is  sev- 
sral  times  mentioned  in  these  sketches,  and  always  with  reference  to  his  inches. 


156  WILLIAM   SAtTRlN. 

stance,  is  conspicuous,  did  not  obtain  their  suffrages  :  a  gfena* 
dier  proportion  of  fame,  and  a  physical  pre-eminence  of  height, 
were  not  the  merits  which  decided  their  preference ;  they  chose 
Mr.  Saurin  for  his  intellectual  stature ;  and  in  selecting  a 
gentleman,  in  whom  I  am  at  a  loss  to  discover  one  glance  of 
the  "  coup  d'ceil  militaire"  and  whose  aspect  is  among  the  most 
unsoldierlike  I  have  ever  witnessed,  they  offered  him  an  honor- 
able testimony  of  the  great  esteem  in  which  he  was  held  by 
his  profession.  He  was  thus,  in  some  degree,  recognised  as 
the  head  of  the  body  to  which  he  belonged. 

His  conduct,  as  chief  of  the  lawyer's  corps,  was  patriotic 
and  discreet.  He  manifested  none  of  those  religious  antipa- 
thies by  which  he  has  been  since  unhappily  distinguished  ;  he 
had  no  share,  either  in  the  infliction  of,  or  the  equivalent  con- 
nivance at  that  system  of  inquisitorial  excruciation,  which,  on 
whosesoever  head  the  guilt  ought  to  lie,  did  unquestionably 
exist  *  His  hands  do  not  smell  of  blood  ;  and  though  a  series 
of  unhappy  incidents  has  since  thrown  him  into  the  arms  of  the 
Orange  faction,  to  which  he  has  been  rather  driven  by  the 
rash  rancor  of  his  antagonists,  than  allured  through  the  genuine 
tendencies  of  his  nature,  in  that  period  of  civil  commotion  he 
discountenanced  the  excesses  of  the  party  who  now  claim  him 
as  their  own.  With  all  his  present  Toryism,  he  appears  to 
have  been  a  Whig;  and  the  republican  tinge  of  his  opinions 
was  brought  out  in  the  great  event  which  succeeded  the  Rebel- 
lion, and  to  which  the  government  was  aware  that  it  would 
inevitably  lead.  If  they  did  not  kindle,  they  allowed  the  fire 
to  rage  on ;  and  they  thought,  and  perhaps  with  justice,  that 
it  would  furnish  a  lurid  light  by  which  the  rents  and  chasms 
in  the  ruinous  and  ill-constructed  fabric  of  the  Irish  legisla- 
ture would  be  more  widely  exposed.  To  repair  such  a  crazy 
and   rotten   building,  many  think,  was  impossible.      It  was 

it  is  probable  that  Sheil  (who  was  of  small  stature)  envied  him  not  a  little.  It 
was  to  him  that  Tom  Moore,  who  was  quite  a  minikin,  put  the  question,  as  he 
looked  up  at  him,  "  Magrath,  it  is  fine  weather  here  below — how  is  it  up  thero 
aloft  with  you?"  — M. 

*  Mr.  Saurin,  during  the  rebellion,  has  been  seen  to  strike  a  drummer  cfhii 
corps  for  weaiing  an  Orange  cockade. 


OPPOSES    THE    UNION.  157 

necessary  that  it  should  be  thrown  down* — but  the  name  of 
country  (and  there  is  a  charm  even  in  a  name)  has  been  buried 
in  the  fall. 

The  Union  was  proposed,  and  Mr.  Saurin  threw  himself  into 
an  indignant  opposition  to  the  measure,  which  he  considered 
fatal  to  Ireland.  He  called  the  Bar  together;  and  upon  his 
motion,  a  resolution  was  passed  by  a  great  majority,  protesting 
against  the  merging  of  the  country  in  the  Imperial  amalgama- 
tion. He  was  elected  a  member  of  the  Irish  House  of  Com- 
mons, and  his  appearance  in  that  profligate  convention  was 
hailed  by  Mr.  Grattan,  who  set  the  highest  value  upon  his 
accession  to  the  national  cause. 

Of  eloquence  there  was  already  a  redundant  supply.  Genius 
abounded  in  the  ranks  of  the  patriots  —  they  were  ardent, 
devoted,  and  inspired.  Mr.  Saurin  reinforced  them  with  his 
more  Spartan  qualities.  Grave  and  sincere,  regarded  as  a 
great  constitutional  lawyer — the  peculiar  representative  of  his 
own  profession  —  a  true,  but  unimpassioned  lover  of  his  country, 
and  as  likely  to  consult  her  permanent  interests  as  to  cherish 
a  romantic  attachment  to  her  dignity  —  he  rose  in  the  House 
of  Commons,  attended  with  a  great  concurrence  of  impressive 
circumstance.  He  addressed  himself  to  great  principles,  and 
took  his  ground  upon  the  broad  foundations  of  legislative  right, 
His  more  splendid  allies  rushed  among  the  ranks  of  their 
adversaries  and  dealt  their  sweeping  invective  about  them ; 
while  Saurin,  in  an  iron  and  somewhat  rusty  armor,  and  wielding 
more  massive  and  ponderous  weapons,  stood  like  a  sturdy  sen- 
tinel before  the  gates  of  the  constitution.  Simple  and  elemen- 
tary positions  were  enforced  by  him  with  a  strenuous  convic- 
tion of  their  truth.  He  denied  the  right  of  the  legislature  to 
alienate  its  sacred  trust.  He  insisted  that  it  would  amount  to 
a  forfeiture  of  that  estate  which  was  derived  from,  and  held 
under  the  people  in  whom  the  reversion  must  perpetually 
remain;  that  they  were  bound  to  consult  the  will  of  the  ma- 
jority of  the  nation,  and  that  the  will  of  that  majority  was  the 
foundation  of  all  law. 

*  It  must  not  be  forgotten  that,  in  most  of  these  sketches,  Mr.  Sheil  affected 
|to  write  as  an  Ey^Ush  observer  of  politics  and  men,  —  |V$, 


158  WILLIAM   SAUEIN. 

Generous  sentiments,  uttered  with  honest  fervency,  are 
important  constituents  of  eloquence;  and  Mr.  Saurin  acquired 
the  fame  of  a  distinguished  speaker.  His  language  was  not 
flowing  or  abundant  —  there  was  no  soaring  in  his  thought,  nor 
majesty  in  his  elocution  ;  but  he  was  clear  and  manly  :  there 
was  a  plain  vigor  about  him.  Thought  started  through  his 
diction  ;  it  wanted  roundness  and  color,  but  it  was  muscular 
and  strong.  It  was  not  "  pinguitudine  nitescens."  If  it  were 
deficient  in  bloom  and  fullness,  it  had  not  a  greasy  and  ple- 
thoric gloss  ;  it  derived  advantages  from  the  absence  of  decora- 
tion, for  its  nakedness  became  the  simplicity  of  primitive  truth. 

Mr.  Saurin  obtained  a  well-merited  popularity.  His  efforts 
were  strenuous  and  unremitted  ;  but  what  could  they  avail  1 
The  minister  had  an  easy  task  to  perform  :  there  was,  at  first, 
a  show  of  coyness  in  the  prostitute  venality  of  the  majority  of 
the  House ;  it  only  required  an  increased  ardor  of  solicitation, 
and  a  more  fervent  pressure  of  the  "  itching  palm."  No  man 
understood  the  arts  of  parliamentary  seduction  better  than 
Lord  Castlereagh.  He  succeeded  to  the  full  extent  of  his 
undertaking,  and  raised  himself  to  the  highest  point  of  ambition 
to  which  a  subject  can  aspire. 

But  those  who  had  listened  to  his  blandishments,  found,  in 
the  emptiness  of  title,  and  in  the  baseness  of  pecuniary  reward, 
an  inadequate  compensation  for  the  loss  of  personal  conse- 
quence which  they  eventually  sustained.  In  place  of  the 
reciprocal  advantages  which  they  might  have  imparted  and 
received,  by  spending  their  fortunes  in  the  metropolis  of  their 
own  country,  such  among  them  as  are  now  exported  in  the 
capacity  of  representatives  from  Ireland  are  lost  in  utter  insig- 
nificance. Instead  of  occupying  the  magnificent  mansions 
which  are  now  falling  into  decay,  they  are  domiciliated  in 
second  stories  of  the  lanes  and  alleys  in  the  vicinity  of  St. 
Stephen's.     They  may  be  seen  every  evening  at  Bellamy's* 

*  In  the  old  House  of  Commons,  which  formerly  had  been  a  Chapel  dedi- 
cated to  St.  Stephen,  the  refreshment-rooms  were  kept  by  Mr.  Bellamy,  whose 
family  still  cater  to  the  requirements  of  "  the  inner  man,"  in  the  refectory  of 
the  new  and  splendid  Palace  of  Westminster,  erected,  at  a  cost  of  some  two 

millions  sterling-   on  the  banks  of  the  Thames.  —  JYL 


THE  DEGRADED  PEERAGE.  159 

digesting  their  solitary  meal,  until  the  "  whipper  in"  has  aroused 
them  to  the  only  purpose  for  which  their  existence  is  recog- 
nised ;  or  in  the  House  itself,  verifying  the  prophetic  descrip- 
tion of  Ourran,  by  "  sleeping  in  their  collars  under  the  manger 
of  the  British  minister." 

The  case  is  still  worse  with  the  anomalous  nobility  of  the 
Irish  Peer.*  There  is  a  sorry  mockery  in  the  title,  which  is 
almost  a  badge,  as  it  is  a  product,  of  his  disgrace.  He  bears 
it  as  the  snail  does  the  painted  shell  elaborated  from  its  slime. 
His  family  are  scarcely  admitted  among  the  aristocracy,  and, 
when  admitted,  it  is  only  to  be  scorned.  It  requires  the  nicest 
exercise  of  subtle  stratagem,  and  the  suppression  of  every 
feeling  of  pride,  on  the  part  of  an  Irish  lady,  to  effect  her  way 
into  the  great  patrician  coteries.  The  scene  which  Miss  Edge- 
worth  has  so  admirably  described  at  the  saloon  of  the  opera- 
house,  in  which  the  Irish  countess  solicits  the  haughty  recog 
nition  of  the  English  duchess,  is  of  nightly  recurrence.  Even 
great  talents  are  not  exempted  from  this  spirit  of  national 
depreciation.  Mr.  Grattan  himself  never  enjoyed  the  full 
dignity  which  ought,  in  every  country,  to  have  been  an  ap- 
panage to  his  genius.  As  to  Lord  Clare,  he  died  of  a  broken 
heart.  The  Duke  of  Bedford  crushed  the  plebeian  peer  with  a 
single  tread .t  What,  then,  must  be  the  case  with  the  inferior 
class  of  Irish  senators;  and  how  must  they  repine  at  the  sui- 

*  By  the  Act  of  Union,  it  was  arranged  that  the  Irish  Peers  should  be  repre- 
sented in  the  Imperial  Parliament  by  twenty-eight,  chosen  from  the  whole 
body,  to  sit  for  life.  But  many  of  the  Irish  Peers  also  have  seats  in  Parliament 
as  possessors  of  English  titles.  Thus  the  Irish  Marquis  of  Downshire  has  his 
seat  in  the  Imperial  Parliament  by  virtue  of  his  English  earldom  of  Hillsbor- 
ough, and  the  Earl  of  Bessborough  sits  for  his  English  barony.  No  Irish  Peer 
can  represent  an  Irish  county  or  borough,  but  the  restriction  does  not  apply  out 
of  Ireland.  Thus  Viscount  Palmerston,  an  Irish  Peer,  sits  in  the  House  of 
Commons  for  the  English  borough  of  Tiverton.  —  M. 

t  Lord  Clare,  the  first  Irishman  who  ever  held  the  Great  Seal  of  Ireland,  was 
virtual  ruler  of  that  country  for  years.  He  exhibited  his  hauteur  to  the  Viceroy, 
the  Duke  of  Bedford,  who  —  with  all  the  pride  of  the  Russell  blood  —  could  not 
believe,  at  first,  that  any  man  could  so  insult  the  representative  of  royalty. 
When  assured  that  it  was  Lord  Clare's  wonted  manner,  the  Duke  turned  his 
back  on  him,  before  the  Privy  Council,  and  let  business  proceed  as  if  Lord 
Clare  had  nev  ?r  existed.  —  Mr 


160  WILLIAM    SAURIN. 

cidal  act  with  which,  in  their  madness,  they  were  tempted  to 
annihilate  their  existence  ! 

I  have  dwelt  upon  the  results  of  the  Union,  as  it  affected 
individual  importance,  because  Mr.  Saurin  appears  to  have 
been  sensible  of  them,  and  to  have  acted  upon  that  sense.  He 
has  never  since  that  event  set  his  foot  upon  the  English  shore. 
He  was  well  aware  that  he  should  disappear  in  the  modern 
Babylon  ;*  and  with  the  worldly  sagacity  by  which  he  is 
characterized,  when  his  country  lost  her  national  importance, 
he  preferred  to  the  lacqueying  of  the  English  aristocracy  the 
enjoyment  of  such  provincial  influence  as  may  be  still  obtained 
in  Ireland.  Mr.  Plunket  resigned  the  situation  of  Attorney- 
General  in  1807.     It  was  offered  to  Mr.  Saurin,  who  accepted  it. 

This  office  is,  perhaps,  the  most  powerful  in  Ireland  :  it  is 
attended  with  great  patronage,  emolument,  and  authority. 
The  Attorney-General  appoints  the  judges  of  the  land,  and 
nominates  to  those  multitudinous  places  with  which  the  gov- 
ernment has  succeeded  in  subduing  the  naturally  democratic 
tendencies  of  the  bar.  Every  measure  in  any  way  connected 
with  the  administration  of  justice  originates  with  him.  In 
England  the  Attorney-General  is  consulted  upon  the  law.  In 
Ireland  he  is  almost  the  law  itself  :  he  not  only  approves, 
but  he  directs.  The  personal  character  of  Mr.  Saurin  gave 
him  an  additional  sway.  He  gained  a  great  individual  ascen- 
dency over  the  mind  of  the  Lord  Chancellor.  In  the  Oastlef 
Cabinet  he  was  almost  supreme  ;  and  his  authority  was  the 
more  readily  submitted  to,  as  it  was  exercised  without  being 
displayed.  He  was  speedily  furnished  with  much  melancholy 
occasion  to  put  his  power  into  action. 

The  Catholic  Board  assumed  a  burlesque  attitude  of  defi- 
ance ;  the  press  became  every  clay  more  violent ;  the  news- 
papers were  tissues   of  libels,  in  the  legal  sense  of  the  word, 

*  By  a  flattering-,  national  self-delusion,  London  is  called  "  Modern  Babylon," 
and  Edinburgh  the  "  Modern  Athens.    — M. 

T  In  Ireland,  "  the  Castle"  of  Dublin  is  the  seat  of  government,  as  the  Pal- 
ace of  St.  James  is  (or  was)  of  England.  It  is  the  town-residence  of  the 
Lord-Lieutenant,  where  his  Privy  Council  meet,  where  he  holds  his  levees  and 
drawing-rooms,  where  he  gives  his  State-balls,  and  where  the  departmental 
Qfljcers  of  the  Executive  carry  on  the  business  of  the  state.-~-Mf 


HIS    POLITICAL    INCONSISTENCY.  161 

for  they  were  envenomed  with  the  most  deleterious  truth. 
Prosecutions  were  instituted  and  conducted  by  Mr.  Saurin:  an 
ebullition  of  popular  resentment  wa»  ihe  result,  and  reciprocal 
animosity  was  engendered  out  of  mutual  recrimination.  The 
orators  were  furious  upon  one  hand,  and  Mr.  Saurin  became 
enraged  upon  the  other.  His  real  character  was  disclosed  in 
the  collision.  He  was  abused,  I  admit,  and  vilified.  The 
foulest  accusations  were  emptied,  from  their  aerial  abodes,  by 
pamphleteers,  upon  his  head.  The  authors  of  the  garret  dis- 
charged their  vituperations  upon  him.  It  was  natural  that  he 
should  get  into  bad  odor;  but  wedded  as  he  was  to  the  public 
interests,  he  should  have  borne  these  aspersions  of  the  popular 
anger  with  a  more  Socratic  temper.  Unhappily,  however, 
he  was  infected  by  this  shrewish  spirit,  and  took  to  scolding. 
In  his  public  speeches  a  weak  virulence  and  spite  were  man 
ifested,  which,  in  such  a  man,  was  deeply  to  be  deplored. 

Much  of  the  blame  ought,  perhaps,  to  attach  to  those  who 
baited  him  into  fury;  and  it  is  not  greatly  to  be  regretted, 
that  many  of  them  were  gored  and  tossed  in  this  ferocious 
contest.  The  original  charges  brought  against  him  were  un- 
just; but  the  vehemence  with  which  they  were  retorted,  as 
well  as  repelled,  divested  them,  in  some  degree,  of  their 
calumnious  quality,  and  exemplified  their  truth.  Mr.  Saurin 
should  have  recollected,  that  he  had  at  one  time  given  utter- 
ance to  language  nearly  as  intemperate  himself,  and  had  laid 
down  the  same  principles  with  a  view  to  a  distinct  application. 
He  had  harangued  upon  the  will  of  the  majority,  and  he  for- 
got that  it  was  constituted  by  the  Papists.  On  a  sudden  he 
was  converted,  from  a  previous  neutrality,  into  the  most  vio- 
lent opponent  of  Roman  Catholic  Emancipation.  I  entertain 
little  doubt  that  his  hostility  was  fully  as  personal  as  it  was 
constitutional.  There  appears  to  be  a  great  inconsistency 
between  his  horror  of  the  Union  and  of  the  Catholics.  They 
are  as  seven  to  one  in  the  immense  population  of  Ireland  ; 
and  when  they  are  debased  by  political  disqualification,  it  can 
only  be  justified  upon  the  ground  that  it  promotes  the  interests 
of  the  Empire. 

But  Mr.  Saurin  discarded  the  idea  of  making  a  sacrifice 


162  WILLTAM   SAUBIN. 

of  Ireland  to  Imperial  considerations,  when  the  benefits  >f  the 
Union  were  pointed  out.  I  fear,,  also,  that  he  wants  magna- 
nimity, and  that  his  antipathies  are  influenced  in  part  by  his 
domestic  recollections.  His  ancestors  were  persecuted  in 
France;  but  his  gratitude  to  the  country  in  which  they  found 
a  refuge,  should  have  suppressed  any  inclination  to  retaliate 
upon  the  religion  of  the  majority  of  its  people.  I  shall  not 
expatiate  upon  the  various  incidents  which  distinguished  this 
period  of  forensic  turmoil.  Suffice  it  to  say,  that  Mr.  Saurin 
obtained  verdicts  of  condemnation.  But  his  high  character 
and  his  peace  of  mind  were  affected  by  his  ignominious  suc- 
cess. He  grew  into  an  object  of  national  distaste.  His  OAvn 
personal  dispositions,  which  are  naturally  kind  and  good,  were 
materially  deteriorated.  Every  man  at  the  oar  with  liberal 
opinions  on  the  Catholic  question,  was  regarded  by  him  with 
dislike.  A  single  popular  sentiment  was  a  disqualification  for 
place. 

But  let  me  turn  from  the  less  favorable  points  of  his  char- 
acter. This  censure  should  be  qualified  by  large  commen- 
dation. His  patronage  was  confined  to  his  party,  but  it  was 
honorably  exercised.  Those  whom  he  advanced  were  able 
and  honest  men.  The  sources  of  justice  were  never  vitiated 
by  any  unworthy  preferences  upon  his  part.  Neither  did  he 
lavish  emolument  on  his  own  family.  In  the  list  of  pensioners 
the  name  of  Saurin  does  not  often  bear  attestation  to  bis  power. 
I  should  add  to  his  other  merits  his  unaffected  modesty.  He 
has  always  been  easy,  accessible,  and  simple.  He  had  none 
of  the  "  morgue  aristocratique,"  nor  the  least  touch  of  official 
superciliousness  on  his  brow. 

Mr.  Saurin,  as  Attorney-General,  may  be  said  to  have  gov- 
erned Ireland  for  fifteen  years  ;*  but,  at  the  moment  when  he 
seemed  to  have  taken  the  firmest  stand  upon  the  height  of  his 
authority,  he  was  precipitated  to  the  ground.  The  Grenvilles 
joined  the  minister.  It  was  stipulated  that  Plunket  should 
be  restored  to  his  former  office.  Mr.  Saurin  was  offered  the 
place  of  Cbief-Justice  of  the  King's  Bench,  which  in  a  fit  of 
splenetic  vexation  he  had  the  folly  to  refuse.     The  new  locai 

*  From  1807  until  January,  1822,  when  Mr.  Plunket  replaced  him.— M. 


OUT    OF    OFFICE.  163 

government  did  not  give  him  a  moment  for  repentance,  and  he 
was  thrown  at  once  from  the  summit  of  his  power.  There  was 
not  a  single  intervening  circumstance  to  break  his  precipitous 
descent,  and  he  was  stunned,  if  not  shattered,  in  the  fall.  He 
might,  however,  have  expected  it ;  he  had  no  political  con- 
nections to  sustain  him.  He  is  married,  indeed,  to  a  sister  of 
the  Marquis  of  Thomond  ;  but  4hat  alliance  was  a  feeble  ob- 
stacle to  the  movement  of  a  great  party. 

His  official  friends  immolated  him  to  exigency,  but  they 
would  have  sacrificed  him  to  convenience.  The  only  man  in 
power,  perhaps,  who  personally  lamented  his  ill  usage,  Avas 
Lord  Manners;  and  even  his  Lordship  was  aware,  for  six 
months  before,  of  the  intended  change,  and  never  disclosed  it 
to  him  in  their  diurnal  walks  to  the  Hall  of  the  Four  Courts. 
This  suppression  Mr.  Saurin  afterward  resented  ;  but,  upon  a 
declaration  from  his  friend  that  he  was  influenced  by  a  regard 
for  his  feelings,  they  were  reconciled.  He  did  not  choose  to 
warn  him,  at  the  banquet,  of  the  sword  that  he  saw  suspended 
over  his  head. 

He  is  now  [1823]  plain  Mr.  Saurin  again,  and  he  bears  this 
reverse  with  a  great  deal  of  apparent,  and  some  real,  fortitude. 
When  he  was  first  deprived  of  his  office,  I  watched  him  in  the 
Hall.  The  public  eye  was  upon  him;  and  the  consciousness 
of  general  observation  in  calamity  inflicts  peculiar  pain.  The 
joyous  alacrity  of  Plunket  was  less  a  matter  of  comment  than 
the  resigned  demeanor  of  his  fallen  rival.  Richard  was  as 
much  gazed  at  as  Bolingbroke.*  It  was  said  by  most  of  those 
who  saw  him,  that  he  looked  as  cheerful  as  ever.  In  fact, 
he  looked  more  cheerful,  and  that  appeared  to  me  to  give  evi- 
dence of  the  constraint  Avhich  he  put  upon  himself.  There 
was  a  forced  hilarity  about  him — he  wore  an  alertness  and 
vivacity,  which  were  not  made  for  his  temperament.  His 
genuine  smile  is  flexible  and  easy  ;  but  upon  this  occasion  it 
lingered  with  a  mechanical  procrastination  upon  the  lips, 
which   showed   that  it   did    not  take  its   origin   at  the  heart. 

*  See  Shakspere's  Richard  II,  Act  5,  Scene  2,  for  the  description  of  the 
contrast  between  the  reception  of  the  unfortunate  and  unpopular  Richard,  and 
that  of  Ids  sue  :essful  rival  Bolingbroke.  —  M. 


164  WILLIAM   SAURIN. 

There  was  also  too  ready  a  proffer  of  the  hand  to  his  old  friends, 
who  gave  him  a  warm  but  a  silent  squeeze. 

I  thought  him  a  suhject  for  study,  and  followed  him  into  the 
Court  of  Chancery.  He  discharged  his  business  with  more 
than  his  accustomed  diligence  and  skill; — but  when  his  part 
was  done,  and  he  bent  his  head  over  a  huge  brief,  the  pages 
of  which  he  seemed  to  turn  without  a  consciousness  of  their 
contents,  I  have  heard  him  heave  at  intervals  a  low  sigh 
When  he  returned  again  to  the  Hall,  I  have  observed  him  in 
a  moment  of  professional  leisure  while  he  was  busied  with  his 
own  solitary  thoughts,  and  I  could  perceive  a  gradual  languor 
stealing  over  the  melancholy  mirth  which  he  had  been  person- 
ating before.  His  figure,  too,  was  bent  and  depressed,  as  he 
walked  back  to  the  Court  of  Chancery ;  and  before  he  passed 
through  the  green  curtains  which  divide  it  from  the  Hall,  I 
have  seen  him  pause  for  an  instant  and  throw  a  look  at  the 
King's  Bench.  It  was  momentary,  but  too  full  of  expression 
to  be  casual,  and  seemed  to  unite  in  its  despondency  a  deep 
sense  of  the  wrong  which  he  had  sustained  from  his  friends, 
and  the  more  painful  injury  which  he  had  inflicted  upon  him- 
self. 

If  Rembrandt  were  living  in  our  times,  he  should  paint  a 
portrait  of  Saurin  :  his  countenance  and  deportment  would 
afford  an  appropriate  subject  to  the  shadowy  pencil  of  that 
great  artist.  There  should  be  no  gradual  melting  of  colors 
into  each  other;  there  should  be  no  softness  of  touch,  and  no 
nice  variety  of  hue  ;  there  should  be  no  sky  —  no  flowers  —  no 
drapery  —  no  marble;  but  a  grave  and  sober-minded  man  should 
stand  upon  the  canvass,  with  the  greater  proportion  of  his  figure 
in  opacity  and  shadow,  and  with  a  strong  line  of  light  breaking 
through  a  monastic  windoAv  upon  his  corrugated  brow.  His 
countenance  is  less  serene  than  tranquil;  it  has  much  deliber- 
ate consideration,  but  little  depth  or  wisdom  ;  its  whole  ex- 
pression is  peculiarly  quiet  and  subdued.  His  eye  is  black 
and  wily,  and  glitters  under  the  mass  of  a  rugged  and  shaggy 
eyebrow.  There  is  a  certain  sweetness  in  its  glance,  some 
what  at  variance  with  the  general  indications  of  charactei 
which  are  conveyed  in  his  look.     His  forehead  is  thoughtful; 


HIS    PUBLIC   DEMEANOR.  165 

but  neither  bold  nor  lofty.  It  is  furrowed  by  long  study  and 
recent  care. 

There  is  a  want  of  intellectual  elevation  in  bis  aspect,  but 
be  has  a  cautious  shrewdness  and  a  discriminating  perspica- 
city. With  much  affability  and  good  nature  about  the  mouth, 
in  the  play  of  its  minuter  expression,  a  sedate  and  permanent, 
vindictiveness  may  readily  be  found.  His  features  are  broad 
and  deeply  founded,  but  they  are  not  blunt;  without  being 
destitute  of  proportion,  they  are  not  finished  with  delicacy  or 
point.  His  dress  is  like  his  manners,  perfectly  plain  and  re- 
markable for  its  neat  propriety.  He  is  Avholly  free  from  vul- 
garity, and  quite  denuded  of  accomplishment.  He  is  of  the 
middle  size,  and  his  frame,  like  his  mind,  is  compact  and  well 
knit  together.  There  is  an  intimation  of  slowness  and  suspi- 
cion in  his  movements,  and  the  spirit  of  caution  seems  to  regu- 
late his  gait.  He  has  nothing  of  the  Catilinarian  walk,*  and 
it  might  be  readily  conjectured  that  he  was  not  destined  for  a 
conspirator. 

His  whole  demeanor  bespeaks  neither  dignity  nor  meanness. 
There  is  no  fraud  about  him  ;  but  there  is  a  disguise  of  his 
emotions  which  borders  upon  guile.  His  passions  are  violent, 
and  are  rather  covered  than  suppressed:  they  have  little  effect 
upon  his  exterior — the  iron  stove  scarcely  glows  with  the  in- 
tensity of  its  internal  fire.  He  looks  altogether  a  worldly  and 
sagacious  man  —  sly,  cunning,  and  considerate  —  not  ungener- 
ous, but  by  no  means  exalted  —  with  some  sentiment,  and  no 
sensibility  :  kind  in  his  impulses,  and  warped  by  involuntary 
prejudice:  gifted  with  the  power  of  dissembling  his  own  feel- 
ings, rather  than  of  assuming  the  character  of  other  men  :  more 
acute  than  comprehensive,  and  subtle  than  refined  :  a  man  of 
point  and  of  detail :  no  adventurer  either  in  conduct  or  specu- 
lation :  a  lover  of  usage,  and  an  enemy  to  innovation  :  per- 
fectly simple  and  unaffected  :  one  who  can  bear  adversity  well, 
and  prosperity  still  better:  a  little  downcast  in  ill-fortune,  and 
not  at  all  supercilious  in  success  :  something  of  a  republican 

*  The  passage  in  which  Sallust  describes  the  peculiar  walk  of  the  great  Con- 
spirator runs  thus:  "  Igitur  color  exsanguis,  fcedi  oculi,  citus  modo,  modo  tar- 
dus incessus"  — M. 


,i66  WILLIAM   SAURLSf. 

by  nature,  but  fashioned  by  circumstances  into  a  tory  :  moral, 
but  not  pious:  decent,  but  not  devout:  honorable,  but  not 
chivalrous :  affectionate,  but  not  tender :  a  man  who  could  go 
far  to  serve  a  friend,  and  a  good  way  to  hurt  a  foe  :  and,  take 
him  for  all  in  all,  a  useful  and  estimable  member  of  society. 

I  have  mentioned  his  Fiench  origin,  and  it  is  legibly  ex- 
pressed in  his  lineaments  and  hue.  In  other  countries,  one 
national  physiognomy  prevails  through  the  mass  of  the  peo- 
ple. In  every  district  and  in  every  class  we  meet  with  a 
single  character  of  face.  But  in  Ireland,  the  imperfect  graft- 
ing of  colonization  is  easily  perceived  in  the  great  variety  of 
countenance  which  is  everywhere  to  be  found  :  the  notches 
are  easily  discerned  upon  the  original  stock. 

The  Dane  of  Kildare  is  known  by  his  erect  form,  his  sand- 
ed complexion,  his  blue  and  independent  eye,  and  the  fairnees 
of  his  rich  and  flowing  hair.  The  Spaniard  in  the  west,  shows 
among  the  dominions  of  Mr.  Martin,*  his  swarthy  features  and 
his  black  Andalusian  eye.  A  Presbyterian  church  in  the 
north,  exhibits  a  quadrangular  breadth  of  jawbone,  and  a 
shrewd  sagacity  of  look  in  its  calculating  and  moral  congrega 
tion,  which  the  best  Baillie  in  Glasgow  would  not  disown. 
Upon  the  southern  mountain  and  in  the  morass,  the  wild  and 
haggard  face  of  the  aboriginal  Irishman  is  thrust  upon  the 
traveller,  through  the  aperture  in  his  habitation  of  mud  which 
pays  the  double  debt  of  a  chimney  and  a  door.  His  red  and 
strongly-curled  hair,  his  angry  and  courageous  eye,  his  short 

*  Richard  Martin,  described  "By  Moore  as  one  who 

"  rales 
The  houseless  wilds  of  Connemara," 
was  member  of  Parliament  for  many  years,  representing  the  county  of  Galway, 
asi  which  he  possessed  very  large  landed  estates.  He  succeeded  in  passing  an 
act  for  the  prevention  and  punishment  of  cruelty  to  animals,  and  was  a  humane 
but  eccentric  man.  His  son,  Thomas  Martin,  succeeded  him  as  owner  of  the 
vast  Connemara  estate  —  a  domain  once  larger  than  the  territory  of  many  a 
reigning  German  Prince.  On  his  death,  his  daughter,  Mrs.  Bell  Martin,  came 
into  possession,  but  the  estates  were  sold  to  satisfy  greedy  money-lenders,  and 
as  the  amount  realized  was  too  small,  she  came  to  New  York,  to  earn  her  liv- 
ing by  literature.  Her  novel  of  "  Julia  Howard,"  reprinted  here,  was  very 
clever.  She  had  written  other  works  in  French.  She  died  in  New  York,  on 
November  7,  1850,  worthy  of  a  better  fate  than  exile  and  poverty. —  M, 


tilS    SKILL    AS    AN    ADVOCATE.  16? 

and  blunted  features,  thrown  at  hazard  into  his  countenance 
and  that  fantastic  compound  of  intrepidity  and  cunning,  oi 
daring  and  of  treachery,  of  generosity  and  of  falsehood,  oi 
fierceness  and  of  humor,  and  of  absurdity  and  genius,  which  ii 
conveyed  in  his  expression,  is  not  inappropriately  discovered 
in  the  midst  of  crags  and  bogs,  and  through  the  medium  of 
smoke.  When  he  descends  into  the  city,  this  barbarian  of  art 
(for  he  has  been  made  so  by  the  landlord  and  the  law  —  nature 
never  intended  him  to  be  so),  presents  a  singular  contrast  to 
the  high  forehead,  the  regular  features,  and  pure  complexion 
of  the  English  settler. 

To  revert  to  Mr.  Saurin  (from  whom  I  ought  not,  perhaps, 
to  have  deviated  so  far),  there  is  still  greater  distinctness,  as 
should  be  the  case,  from  their  proximity  to  their  source,  in  the 
descendants  from  the  French  Protestants  who  obtained  an  asy- 
lum in  Ireland.  The  Huguenot  is  stamped  upon  them  ;*  I  can 
read  in  their  faces,  not  only  the  relics  of  their  country,  but  of 
their  religion.  They  are  not  only  Frenchmen  in  color,  but 
Calvinists  in  expression.  They  are  serious,  grave,  and  almost 
sombre,  and  have  even  a  shade  of  fanaticism  diffused  over  the 
world liness  by  which  they  are  practically  characterized.  Mr. 
Saurin  is  no  fanatic  ;  on  the  contrary,  I  believe  that  his  only 
test  of  the  true  religion  is  the  law  of  the  land.  He  does  not 
belong  to  the  "saint  party,"  nor  is  he  known  by  the  sanctimo- 
nious avidity  by  which  that  pious  and  rapacious  body  is  dis- 
tinguished at  the  Irish  bar.  Still  there  is  a  touch  of  John 
Calvinfupon  him,  and  he  looks  the  fac-simile  of  an  old  Protest- 
ant professor  of  logic  whom  I  remember  to  have  seen  in  one  of 
the  colleges  at  Nismes. 

I  have  enlarged  upon  the  figure  and  aspect  of  this  eminent 
barrister,  because  they  intimate  much  of  his  mind.  In  his  ca- 
pacity as  an  advocate  in  a  court  of  equity,  he  deserves  great 

*  The  French  Catholics  gave  the  nick-name  of  Huguenots  to  their  Protestant 
brothers,  but  the  derivation  of  the  word  is  uncertain.  It  was  not  used  until  the 
middle  of  the  sixteenth  century.  —  M. 

t  John  Calvin  was  a  Frenchman.  Differing  from  Luther,  on  many  points  of 
doctrine  and  discipline,  he  established  a  schism  less  tolerant  and  more  severe 
than  simple  Protestantism.  Unable  to  convert  Servetus,  he  calmly  consigned 
him  to  the  flumes-"  for  the  love  of  God  !"— M. 


168  WILLIAM   SAURllsr. 

encomium.  He  is  not  a  great  case-lawyer.  He  is  not  likft 
Sergeant  Lefroy,*  an  ambulatory  index  of  discordant  names ; 
«e  is  stored  with  knowledge  :  principle  is  not  merely  deposited 
in  his  memory,  but  inlaid  and  tesselated  in  his  mind  :  it  enters 
into  his  habitual  thinking.  No  man  is  better  versed  in  the  art 
of  putting  facts  :  he  brings  with  a  peculiar  felicity  and  skill 
the  favorable  parts  of  his  client's  case  into  prominence,  and. 
shows  still  greater  acuteness  in  suppressing  or  glossing  over 
whatever  may  be  prejudicial  to  his  interests.  He  invests  the 
most  hopeless,  and  I  will  even  add,  the  most  dishonest  cause,  with 
a  most  deceitful  plausibility;  and  the  total  absence  of  all  effort, 
and  the  ease  and  apparent  sincerity  of  his  manner,  give  him  at 
times  a  superiority  even  to  Plunket  himself,  who,  by  the  energy 
into  which  he  is  hurried  at  moments  by  his  more  ardent  and 
eloquent  temperament,  creates  a  suspicion  that  it  must  be  a 
bad  cause  which  requires  so  much  display  of  power.  In  hear- 
ing the  latter,  you  are  perpetually  thinking  of  him  and  his 
faculties;  in  hearing  Saurin,  you  remember  nothing  but  the 
cause — he  disappears  in  the  facts. 

Saurin  also  shows  singular  tact  in  the  management  of  the 
Court.  Lord-Chancellor  Manners  is  actually  bewildered  by 
Plunket :  it  is  from  his  Lordship's  premises  that  he  argues 
against  him  :  he  entangles  him  in  a  net  of  sophistry  wrought 
out  of  his  own  suggestion.  This  is  not  very  agreeable  to  hu- 
man vanity,  and  Chancellors  are  men.  Saurin,  on  the  other 
hand,  accommodates  himself  to  every  view  of  the  Court.  He 
gently  and  insensibly  conducts  his  Lordship  to  a  conclusion  — 
Plunket  precipitates  him  into  it  at  once.  But  Lord  Manners 
struggles  hard  upon  the  brink,  and  often  escapes  from  his 
grasp. 

In  this  faculty  of  adaptation  to  the  previous  opinions  and 
character  of  the  judge  whom  he  addresses,  I  consider  Saurin 
as  perhaps  the  most  useful  advocate  in  the  Court  of  Chancery 
—  at  the  same  time,  in  reach  of  thought,  variety  of  attribute, 
versatility  of  resource,  and  power  of  diction,  he  is  far  inferior 
to  his  distinguished  successor  in  office.     But  Plunket  is  a  sena- 

*  The  subject  of  a  subsequent  sketch,  and  now  [1854]  Chief-.Tugtice  of 
Ireland.  —  M. 


HIS    DISTASTE    FOE    LETTERS.  169 

tor  and  a  statesman,  and  Saurin  is  a  lawyer — not  a  mere  one, 
indeed;  but  the  legal  faculty  is  greatly  predominant  in  his 
mind.  His  leisure  has  never  been  dedicated  to  the  acquisition 
of  scientific  knowledge,  nor  has  he  sought  a  relaxation  from 
his  severer  occupations  in  the  softness  of  the  politer  arts.  His 
earliest  tastes  and  predilections  were  always  in  coincidence 
with  his  profession.  Free  from  all  literary  addiction,  he  not 
only  did  not  listen  to,  but  never  heard,  the  solicitations  of  the 
Muse.  Men  with  the  strongest  passion  for  higher  and  more 
elegant  enjoyments  have  frequently  repressed  that  tendency, 
from  a  fear  that  it  might  lead  them  from  the  pursuit  of  more 
substantial  objects. 

It  was  not  necessary  that  Mr.  Saurin  should  stop  his  ears 
against  the  voice  of  the  siren — he  was  born  deaf  to  her  en- 
chantments. I  believe  that  this  was  a  sort  of  good  fortune  in 
his  nature.  Literary  accomplishments  are  often  of  prejudice, 
and  very  seldom  of  any  utility,  at  the  bar.  The  profession 
itself  may  occasionally  afford  a  respite  from  its  more  rigid  avo- 
cations, and  invite  of  its  own  accord  to  a  temporary  deviation 
from  ?ts  more  dreary  pursuits.  There  are  moments  in  which  a 
familiarity  with  the  great  models  of  eloquence  and  of  high 
thinking  may  be  converted  into  use.  But  a  lawyer  like  Mr. 
Saurin  will  think,  and  wisely  perhaps,  that  the  acquisition  of 
the  embellishing  faculties  is  seldom  attended  with  a  sufficiently 
frequent  opportunity  for  their  display,  to  compensate  for  the 
dangers  of  the  deviation  which  they  require  from  the  straight- 
forward road  to  professional  eminence,  and  will  pursue  his 
progress  —  like  the  American  traveller,  who,  in  journeying 
through  his  vast  prairies,  passes  without  regard  the  fertile 
landscapes  which  occasionally  lie  adjacent  to  his  way,  and 
never  turns  from  his  track  for  the  sake  of  the  rich  fruits  and 
the  refreshing  springs  of  those  romantic  recesses,  which,  how- 
ever delicious  they  may  appear,  may  bewilder  him  in  a  wil- 
derness of  sweets,  and  lead  him  for  ever  astray  from  the  final 
object  of  his  destination. 

Vol.  I.— 8 


HENRY   JOY. 

Mr.  Joy,  the  present  Solicitor-General  for  Ireland  [1823], 
and  the  anti-papistical  associate  in  office  of  the  chief-advocate 
of  the  Roman  Catholic  claims,  Mr.  Plunket,  is  the  son  of  a 
literary  man,  who  was  the  editor  of  a  newspaper  in  Belfast* 
To  the  violent  spirit  which  characterized  the  democratic  lucu- 
brations of  the  father,  I  am  inclined  to  attribute  a  mistake  into 
which  the  public  have  fallen  with  respect  to  the  juvenile  pro- 
pensities of  the  son.  Mr.  Joy  is  commonly  considered  to  have 
been  addicted  to  liberal  principles  in  his  early  life,  and  has 
been  reproached  with  having  started  a  patriot.  But  whiggism 
is  not  a  family  disorder,  nor  have  I  been  able  to  discover  any 
grounds  for  thinking  that  Mr.  Joy  was  at  any  time  the  profes- 
sor of  opinions  at  variance   with  his  present  political  creed. 

*  Henry  Joy,  born  in  1767,  was  called  to  the  Irish  bar  in  1788.  He  was 
a  good  lawyer,  as  well  as  an  able  advocate.  He  had  a  very  good-humored, 
insinuating  way  with  witnesses  as  well  as  juries,  and  was  happy  at  retort.  In 
1827,  when  Plunket  was  made  Chief-Justice  of  the  Common  Pleas,  he  was 
succeeded  as  Attorney-General,  by  Joy.  In  1831,  on  the  retirement  of  Lord 
Guillamore  (Standish  O'Grady),  Mr.  Joy  became  Chief  Baron  of  the  Ex- 
chequer, and  held  that  high  office  until  his  death,  wbich  took  placf ,  near  Dublin, 
on  June  5,  1838.  —  Chief  Baron  Joy  was  an  impartial  and  humane  administra- 
tor of  the  law.  He  was  repeatedly  pressed  to  enter  Parliament,  but  always 
declined. — His  name  presented  an  obvious  subject  for  Lord  Norbury'g  wit. 
An  attorney,  named  Hope,  prayed  his  Lordship  to  wait  a  few  moments  for  his 
leading  Counsel,  Mr.  Joy,  who  was  unavoidably  detained  and  would  pres- 
ently attend.  His  Lordship's  very  small  stock  of  patience  was  soon  exhausted 
and  he  said,  "  We  can  wait  no  longer — 

" '  Although  Hope  told  a  flattering  tale, 
And  said  the  Joy  would  soon  return,'  n 
aad  directed  the  next  cage  to  be  called  on.  —  M. 


HIS    POLITICAL    CREED.  Ifi 

Since  lie  was  called  to  the  Bar,  which  was  in  the  year  1788,  I 
can  not  find  a  single  deviation  in  his  conduct  from  the  path  of 
obvious  prudence,  which  his  instinctive  tendencies  would 
naturally  have  led  him  to  adopt,  and  to  which  his  matured 
experience  must  have  instructed  him  to  adhere.  It  required 
little  sagacity  to  perceive  that  by  allying  himself  with  the 
religious  and  aristocratic  passions  of  the  prosperous  faction,  he 
was  much  more  likely  to  attain  distinction,  than  by  any  chival 
rous  dedication  of  his  abilities  to  a  more  noble,  but  unrequiting 
cause. 

Had  he  had  the  misfortune  to  inherit  so  sterile  and  unprofit- 
able a  patrimony  as  the  love  of  Ireland,  he  might  still,  perhaps, 
have  risen  to  eminence  and  honor.  But  his  success  would 
have  been  achieved  in  despite  of  his  principles.  By  choosing 
a  different  course  he  has  succeeded  through  them.  Instead  of 
the  difficult  and  laborious  path  by  which  so  few  have  won  their 
way,  and  which  is  filled  not  only  with  obstacles  but  thorns,  he 
selected  the  smoother  road,  the  progress  in  which  is  as  easy  as 
it  is  sure  —  which  is  thronged  by  crowds,  who,  instead  of 
impeding  individual  advancement,  sustain  and  bear  each  other 
on  —  and  which  not  only  leads  with  more  directness  to  a 
splendid  elevation,  but  is  bordered  with  many  fertile  and  rich 
retreats,  in  which  those  who  are  either  unable  or  unwilling  to 
prosecute  their  journey  to  the  more  distant  and  shining  objects 
to  which  it  conducts  at  last,  are  certain  of  finding  an  adjacent 
place  of  secure  and  permanent  repose.  In  this  inviting  path, 
the  weak  and  the  incapable  may  sit  down  in  ease  and  luxury, 
even  in  the  lowest  gradations  of  ascent ;  while  the  more  vigor- 
ous and  aspiring  receive  an  impulse  from  the  very  ground  they 
tread,  and  are  hurried  rapidly  along.  Mr.  Joy  could  not  fail 
to  see  the  advantages  of  this  accelerating  course,  nor  do  I 
impute  much  blame  to  him  for  having  yielded  to  its  allure- 
ments. He  has,  perhaps,  acted  from  that  kind  of  artificial 
conviction,  into  which  the  mind  of  an  honorable  man  may  at 
last  succeed  in  torturing  itself.  Conscience,  like  every  other 
judge,  may  be  misled,  and  there  is  no  advocate  so  eloquent  as 
self-interest  before  that  high,  but  not  infallible  tribunal. 

Whatever  were  his  motives  in  choosing  this  judicious  though 


172  henry  joy. 

not  very  exalted  course,  Mr.  Joy  soon  distinguished  himself  by 
his  zeal  in  his  vocation,  and  became  prominent  among  the 
stanch  Tories  at  the  Bar.  He  displayed  in  its  fullest  force 
that  sort  of  sophisticated  loyalty,  of  which  vehement  Protest- 
ants are  in  the  habit  of  making  a  boastful  profession  in  Ireland, 
and  carried  the  supererogatory  sentiment  into  practice,  even  at 
the  convivial  meetings  of  the  Bar.  A  lawyer,  who  has  since 
risen  to  considerable  distinction,  and  whose  youth  was  encom- 
passed by  calamities,  which  it  required  a  rare  combination  of 
talents  and  of  fortitude  to  surmount,  was  selected  by  Mr.  Joy 
for  an  early  manifestation  of  his  devotedness  to  the  cause, 
which  it  required  no  very  high  spirit  of  prophecy  to  foresee 
would  be  ultimately  canonized  by  success.  It  was  upon  the 
motion  of  Mr.  Joy,  that  the  barrister  to  whom  I  allude,  was 
expelled,  for  his  republican  tendencies,  from  the  Bar-mess 
of  the  Northeast  Circuit.  In  recommending  so  very  rigor- 
ous a  measure,  he  gave  proof  of  his  earnestness  and  of  his 
good  taste.  The  expulsion  of  an  associate,  whom  an  almost 
daily  intercourse  ought  to  have  invested  with  at  least  the  sem- 
blances of  friendship,  afforded  abundant  evidence  of  the  sin- 
cerity of  the  emotion  with  which  he  was  influenced,  while  his 
discrimination  was  approved,  by  marking  a  man  out  for  ruin, 
whose  endowments  were  sufficiently  conspicuous  to  direct  the 
general  attention,  not  only  to  the  peculiar  victim  that  suffered 
in  the  sacrifice,  but  to  the  priest  who  presided  at  the  immolation. 
This  unequivocal  exhibition  of  enthusiastic  loyalty  was 
followed  by  other  instances  of  equally  devoted  and  not  more 
disinterested  attachment  to  the  government,  and  Mr.  Joy 
gradually  grew  into  the  favor  of  those  who  are  the  distributors 
of  honor  and  of  emolument  at  the  Bar.  He  did  not,  however, 
abuse  the  predilections  of  authority  for  any  mean  or  inglorious 
purpose.  He  is,  I  believe,  unsullied  by  any  sordid  passion  ; 
and  whatever  may  be  his  faults,  avarice  is  not  among  them. 
He  has  never  been  an  occupant  of  any  one  of  the  paltry  offices 
at  the  Bar,  to  the  invention  of  which  the  genius  of  Irish  Secre- 
taries is  unremittingly  applied.  Aiming  at  loftier  objects,  he 
preserved  a  character  for  independence,  by  abstaining  from 
solicitation. 


HIS    SYMPATHY    WITH   SAURIN.  173 

It  would  be  tedious  to  trace  his  progress  through  the  various 
stages  of  professional  success  which  conduct  to  celebrity  at 
last.  A  lawyer  advances  by  movements  almost  impercepti- 
ble, from  obscurity  into  note,  and  from  note  to  fame ;  and 
would  find  it  difficult  to  ascribe  with  certainty  the  consumma- 
tion of  his  success  to  any  direct  or  immediate  cause.  It  is  by 
a  continued  series  of  meritorious  effort  and  of  fortunate  event, 
that  eminence  is  to  be  attained  at  the  Bar.  I  pass  by  the 
many  years  of  labor  in  which  Mr.  Joy,  in  obedience  to  the 
destinies  of  his  profession,  must  have  expended  the  flower  of 
his  life,  and  lead  him  directly  to  the  administration  of  Mr. 
Saurin.  That  gentleman,  the  Coryphaeus  of  the  Orange  party, 
formed  for  Mr.  Joy  a  strong  political  partiality.  He  found  in 
Mr.  Joy  the  cardinal  virtue,  which,  in  his  opinion,  is  the  hinge 
of  all  integrity  and  honor,  and  in  the  absence  of  which  the 
highest  genius  and  the  deepest  knowledge  are  wholly  without 
avail.  With  Mr.  Saurin,  Orangeism  in  politics  has  all  the 
efficacy  of  charity  in  religion,  and  in  the  person  of  Mr.  Joy, 
he  found  many  conspicuous  qualities  set-off  by  the  full  lustre  of 
Protestantism.  This  community  of  sentiment  engendered  a 
virulent  sympathy  between  them. 

Mr.  Joy  was  appointed  one  of  the  three  Sergeants,  who  take 
precedence   after  the    Attorney   and    Solicitor  General,*   and 

*  In  Ireland  there  are  only  three  Sergeants-at-Law,  who  are  appointed  by 
the  Crown,  and  take  precedence,  after  the  Attorney  and  Solicitor  General,  over 
the  rest  of  the  bar.  In  England,  any  barrister  of  a  certain  standing  may  "  as- 
sume the  coif"  —  that  is,  wear  a  wig  with  a  black  patch  on  the  crown  —  pro- 
vided he  pay  the  usual  expenses,  amounting  to  one  hundred  pounds  sterling. 
He  is  then  called  "  Mr.  Sergeant,"  sits  within  the  bar,  with  the  Queen's  Coun- 
sel, and  takes  precedence  with  them.  There  is  this  disadvantage :  as  a  Ser- 
geant-at-Law  can  not  hold  a  brief  under  any  one  but  a  Queen's  Counsel,  or 
another  Sergeant  of  seniority  to  himself,  he  is  precluded,  in  point  of  fact,  from 
being  ether  than  a  leader  in  each  case  he  appears  in  ;  and  it  sometimes  happens 
that  a  barrister  in  good  practice,  whose  ambition  leads  him  to  take  the  coif, 
floun  finds  himself  briefless  —  as  he  can  not  act  as  junior,  and  the  attorneys  may 
not  think  so  well  of  him  as  to  employ  him  as  a  leader.  In  England,  every  law- 
yer, previous  to  taking  his  seat  as  a  Judge,  undergoes  the  formality  and  expense 
of  being  made  a  Sergeant-at-Law.  When  a  barrister  is  of  sufficient  standing, 
it  is  usual  to  make  him  "  one  of  Her  Majesty's  Counsel,"  which  entitles  him  to 
fit  within  the  bar,  gives  him  precedence  over  the  rest  of  the  profession,  an4 


174  HENRY   JOY. 

enjoy  a  sort  of  customary  right  to  promotion  to  the  Bench. 
Even  before  they  are  raised  to  the  judicial  station,  they  occa- 
sionally act  in  lieu  of  any  of  the  judges,  who  may  happen  to 
be  prevented  by  illness  from  going  the  circuit.  The  malady 
of  a  judge,  to  such  an  extent  of  incapacity,  is  not,  however,  of 
very  frequent  occurrence.  A  deduction  from  his  salary,  to  the 
amount  of  four  hundred  pounds,  is  inflicted  as  a  sort  of  penalty, 
in  every  instance  in  which  he  declines  attending  the  assizes, 
and  the  expedient  has  been  found  peculiarly  sanative.  It  not 
unfrequently  happens  that  one  of  the  twelve  sages,*  who  has 

entitles  him  to  employment  in  all  cases,  civil  and  criminal,  between  the  Crown 
and  the  subject.  Out  of  a  bar  consisting-  of  about  six  hundred,  in  England, 
between  forty  and  fifty  are  Queen's  Counsel;  so  that  the  distinction,  which  is 
seldom  conferred  except  for  merit,  is  an  important  one,  as  it  virtually  bestows 
professional  rank  on  the  recipient.  A  Queen's  Counsel  may  be  employed 
against  the  Crown,  in  the  courts  of  law,  on  paying  a  fee  of  ten  guinea?,  nnd 
obtaining  permission,  which  is  rarely  refused,  from  the  Attorney-General.  But 
the  Crown  has  a  prior  right  to  his  services,  if  it  require  them.  What  is  called 
•'  a  patent  of  precedency"  is  sometimes  given  to  Sergeants-at-Law,  which  places 
them,  according  to  its  date,  in  possession  of  all  the  privileges  enjoyed  by 
Queen's  Counsel.  Mr.  Sergeant  Wilkins,  the  ablest  advocate  now  at  the  Eng- 
lish bar,  has  such  a  patent.  Mr.  O'Connell,  who  was  for  many  years  at  the 
head  of  his  profession  in  Ireland,  never  was  made  Counsel  to  the  Crown,  owing 
to  his  politics  being  hostile  to  those  of  the  Lord-Chancellor  (Manners),  who 
had  the  disposal  of  such  honors.  Eventually,  he  received  a  patent  of  prece- 
dency. In  the  Ecclesiastical  Courts,  no  barristers  are  allowed  to  plead  unless 
*hey  have  taken  the  degree  of  Doctor  of  Civil  Law,  at  one  of  the  Universities. 
In  England,  politics  are  seldom  regarded  now  in  the  disposal  of  silk-gowns. 
This  may  require  explanation:  a  Queen's  Counsel  wears  a  silken  and  an  ordi- 
nary barrister  a  stuff"  gown.  The  former,  on  solemn  occasions,  hides  his  head 
in  a  full-bottomed  wig,  made  of  horsehair,  and  whitened  with  flour  or  powdered 
starch :  the  latter  wears  a  plain  peruke,  of  the  same  quality,  with  two  small 
tails  behind.  Hence  the  saying,  "  The  wisdom's  in  the  wig!"  There  are  nei- 
ther Queen's  Counsel,  nor  Sergeants-at-Law,  nor  patents  of  precedency,  at  the 
Scottish  bar;  but  they  get  on  very  well  without  them.  —  M. 

*  In  Ireland,  besides  two  equity  Judges  (Lord  Chancellor  and  Master  cf  the 
Rolls),  there  are  twelve  principal  Judges,  who  dispose  of  criminal  and  nisi 
vrhis  cases.  In  Scotland,  there  are  thirteen  Judges,  of  whom,  seven  are  Lords 
of  the  Justiciary  or  chief  criminal  Court.  In  England,  there  are  seven  equity, 
and  fifteen  principal  Judges  for  criminal  cases.  In  England  and  Ireland,  there 
*re  also  Judges  of  the  Prerogative  and  Ecclesiastical  Courts.  There  also  are 
county  and  other  local  Judges  in  every  county  of  the  United  Kingdom,  besides 
vonirnissioners  of  Bankruptcy  and  Insolvency.     The  largest  salary  is  the  Lord 


HIS   STANDING-   AT   THE  BAR.  175 

lain  almost  dead  during  the  term,  at  the  sound  of  the  circuit- 
trumpet,  starts,  as  it  were  into  a  judicial  resurrection,  and,  pre- 
ceded by  the  gorgeous  procession  of  bum-bailiffs,  bears  his 
cadaverous  attestation  through  the  land,  to  the  miraculous 
agency  of  the  King's  commission. 

However,  it  does  upon  occasion  happen  that  this  restorative, 
powerful  as  it  is,  loses  its  preternatural  operation,  and  one  of 
the  Sergeants  is  called  upon  to  take  the  place  of  any  of  the 
errained  dignitaries  of  the  Bench,  who  does  not  require  the 
certificate  of  a  physician  to  satisfy  the  public  of  the  reality 
of  his  venerable  ailments.  This  proximity  to  the  Bench  gives 
a  Sergeant  considerable  weight.  In  raising  Mr.  Joy  to  an 
office  which  affords  so  many  honorable  anticipations,  Mr. 
Saurin  must  have  been  sensible  that  he  added  to  his  personal 
influence,  by  the  elevation  of  so  unqualified  an  adherent  to  the 
party  of  which  he  was  the  head.  Mr.  Joy  had,  besides,  a  high 
individual  rank.  Before  his  promotion  his  business  was  con- 
si  lerable,  and   it  afterward  rapidly  increased.     It  was  princi- 

Chancellor's  —  ten  thousand  pounds  sterling,  a  year,  in  England.  The  average 
salaries  of  the  other  principal  Judges  are  about  five  thousand  pounds  sterling 
a  year.  The  County  Court  Judges  receive  about  one  thousand  pounds  sterling 
per  annum  in  England  and  Ireland,  and  about  eight  hundred  pounds  sterling 
in  Scotland.  All  the  appointments  are  for  life.  No  Judge  is  removable  by 
the  Crown  (except  the  Lord  Chancellor,,  who  retires  with  the  Ministry,  of 
whom  he  is  one),  but  his  removal  can  take  place  on  an  address  from  both 
Houses  of  Parliament,  after  gross  misconduct  is  proven  before  them.  Every 
Judge,  on  retiring,  after  fifteen  years'  service,  or  ill-health,  has  a  life-pension 
of  two  thirds  of  his  salary,  but  the  Lord  Chancellor,  however  brief  his  tenure 
of  office,  has  a  pension  of  five  thousand  pounds  sterling  a  year,  as,  having  once 
quieted  the  Bar,  for  the  Bench,  he  can  not  resume  his  practice  in  the  Courts  of 
Law.  But  the  ex-Chancellors,  all  of  whom  are  peers,  sit  in  the  House  of 
Lords,,  every  Session,  hearing  appeals  from  the  different  lavv-Courts  throughout 
tho  whole  Empire  (Colonies  included)  and  thus  render  great  service,  fully  the 
value  of  their  pensions,  to  the  public.  The  House  of  Lords  is  the  highest 
court  of  judicature  in  the  British  Empire,  and  "  the  Law  Lords,"  as  they  are 
called,  chiefly  give  the  decisions  —  the  lay-lords,  who  are  not  lawyers,  seldom 
interfering.  For  the  last  eighteen  years,  Lord  Brougham,  in  particular,  has 
devoted  his  time,  energies,  and  vast  knowledge,  to  the  adjudication  of  Appeals 
before  the  House  of  Lords.  It  may  be  remarked,  as  a  curious  anomaly,  that 
the  Lord  Chancellor  and  any  other  Judge,  whose  decisions  may  be  appealed 
against  (if  a  peer,  such  as  Lord  Chief-Justice  Campbell,  for  instance),  may 
bear  and  vote  on  such  appeals  — literally  on  their  own  judgments  !  —  M. 


176  HENRY    JOY. 

pally  augmented  in  Chancery,  where  pre-audience  is  of  the 
utmost  moment.  Lord  Manners  is  disposed  to  allow  too  deep 
a  permanence  to  the  earliest  impression,  and  whoever  first 
addresses  him  has  the  odds  in  his  favor.  The  enjoyment  of 
priority  swelled  the  bag  of  Mr.  Joy,  which  was  soon  distended 
into  an  equality  with  that  of  Mr.  Bushe. 

That  great  advocate  found  in  Mr.  Joy  a  dangerous  compet- 
itor. The  latter  was  generally  supposed  to  be  more  pro- 
foundly read,  and  the  abstract  principles  of  equity  were  traced 
by  sagacious  solicitors  in  the  folds  and  furrows  of  his  brow. 
The  eloquence  of  Bushe  was  little  appreciated  by  men  who 
thought,  that  because  they  had  been  delighted  they  ought 
not  to  have  been  convinced.  Joy  had  a  more  logical  aspect 
in  the  eyes  of  those  who  conceive  that  genius  affords  prima 
facie  evidence  against  knowledge,  and  grew  into  a  gradual 
preference  at  the  Chancery  bar.  It  was  no  light  recommen- 
dation to  him  that  he  was  the  protege  of  Saurin,  who  could  not 
bring  himself  to  forgive  the  liberalism  of  his  colleague,  and 
was  not  unwilling  to  assist  the  prosperous  competition  of  his 
more  Protestant  Sieve.  His  strenuous  protection  gave  strong 
reasons  to  Bushe  to  tremble  at  Joy's  pretensions  to  the  highest 
seat  upon  the  Bench.  Bushe  had  himself  declined  the  office 
of  a  puisne  judge,*  in  the  just  expectation  of  attaining  to 
that,  which  he  at  present  occupies  in  a  manner  so  useful  to 
the  country  and  so  creditable  to  himself.  But  he  was  doomed 
to  the  endurance  of  a  long  interval  of  suspense  before  his 
present  fortunate,  and  I  may  even  call  it  accidental,  elevation. 
He  had  already  been  sufficiently  annoyed  by  the  perverse 
longevity  of  Lord  Norbury,t  and  the  no  less  vexatious  hesi- 
tations of  Lord  Downes,f  who  tortured  him  for  years  with  the 

*  In  England  and  Ireland,  the  Chief  Justices  who  preside  over  the  Courts 
of  Queen's  Bench,  Common  Pleas,  and  Exchequer,  are  familiarly  called  chiefs. 
The  judges  under  them  are  called  puisne  (pronounced  puny)  from  a  French 
adjective  signifying  younger  and  inferior.  —  M. 

t  Lord  Norbury  (the  subject  of  a  subsequent  sketch),  who  was  Chief- Justice 
of  the  Common  Pleas  in  Ireland,  was  seventy-eight  years  old  in  1825  when 
this  was  written,  and  had  then  been  twenty-three  years  on  the  Bench.  —  M. 

t  William  Downes,  called  to  the  Irish  bar  in  1766,  was  made  a  Judge  in  1792. 
During  Emmett's  insurrection  in  1803,  Lord  Kilwarden  was  murdered  by  tne 


HIS   EXPECTATION    OF    PROMOTION.  iTi 

judicial  coquetry  of  affected  resignation.  But  the  appearance 
of  another  candidate  for  the  object  of  his  protracted  aspira- 
tions, had  well  nigh  broken  his  spirit,  and  reduced  him  fc» 
despair. 

It  was  at  one  time  quite  notorious,  that  if  a  vacancy  ha( 
occurred  in  the  Chief-Justiceship  of  the  King's  Bench,  Saurii 
would  have  exercised  his  influence  in  behalf  of  his  favorite 
and  it  was  almost  equally  certain  that  his  influence  would  have 
prevailed.  In  the  general  notion,  Joy  was  soon  to  preside  in 
the  room  of  Downes,  and  his  own  demeanor  tended  not  a  little 
to  confirm  it.  The  auspices  of  success  were  assembled  in  his 
aspect,  as  conspicuously  as  the  omens  of  disaster  were  collected 
in  the  bearing  of  Mr.  Bushe.  The  latter  exhibited  all  the 
most  painful  symptoms  of  the  malady  of  procrastinated  hope. 
The  natural  buoyancy  of  his  spirit  sunk  under  the  oppressive 
and  accumulated  solicitude  that  weighed  upon  him.  Conscious 
of  the  power  of  our  emotions,  and  of  the  readiness  with  which 
they  break  into  external  results,  he  was  ever  on  his  guard 
against  them.  He  well  knew  how  speedily  misfortune  is  de- 
tected by  the  vulgar  and  heartless  crowd  we  call  the  world, 
and  made  every  effort  to  rescue  himself  from  their  ignominious 
commiseration.  To  escape  from  a  sentiment  which  is  so  closely 
connected  with  contempt,  he  wrought  himself  at  moments  into 
a  wild  and  feverish  hilarity  ;  but  the  care  that  consumes  the 
heart  manifested  itself,  in  spite  of  all  his  efforts  to  conceal  it. 
His  bursts  of  high-wrought  joyousness  were  speedily  followed 
by  the  depression  which  usually  succeeds  to  an  unnatural  ine- 

mob,  who  mistook  him  for  Lord  Carleton,  the  Judge  who  presided  at  the  trial  and 
condemnation  of  Henry  and  John  Sheares,  in  1798.  Downes  was  appointed 
to  succeed  Lord  Kihvarden,  as  Chief  Justice  of  the  King's  Bench.  He  was 
raised  to  the  peerage,  as  Baron  Downes  (with  remainder,  on  default  of  lawful 
male  issue,  to  his  cousin,  the  gallant  Sir  Ulysses  de  Burgh,  the  present  peer),  on 
his  relinquishing  the  ennine  in  March,  1822.  He  died,  at  a  very  advanced  age, 
in  March,  1825.  Lord  Downes  was  Vice-Chancellor  of  the  University  of  Dublin. 
He  was  a  large,  unwieldy  man,  and  Curran  described  him  as  "  a  human  quag- 
mire,"—  on  the  bench,  he  was  tremulous  as  if  he  were  composed  of  calves'- 
feet  jelly.  He  was  at  once  solemn  and  ponderous.  He  had  never  been  mar- 
ried, and  his  rigid  moral  conduct  caused  him  to  be  designated  the  "virgin 
judge  "  Withal,  he  was  patient,  a  good  listener,  a  pains-taking  man,  and  had 
£  competent  share  of  legal  knowledge. — M. 

8* 


178  HENRY  JOY. 

briation  of  the  mind  ;  his  eyes  used  to  be  fixed  in  a  heavy 
and  abstracted  glare;  his  face  was  suffused  with  a  murky  and 
unwholesome  red  —  melancholy  seemed  to  "  bake  his  blood." 
He  was  vacant  when  disengaged,  and  impatient  when  occu- 
pied, and  every  external  circumstance  about  him  attested  the 
workings  of  solicitude  that  were  going  on  within.  It  was 
truly  distressing  to  see  this  eloquent,  high-minded,  and  gen- 
erous man,  dying  of  the  ague  of  expectation,  and  alternately 
shivering  with  wretched  disappointment,  and  inflamed  with 
miserable  hope. 

Joy,  on  the  other  hand,  displayed  all  the  characteristics  of 
prosperity,  and  would  have  been  set  down  by  the  most  casual 
observer  as  a  peculiarly  successful  man.  An  air  of  good  for- 
tune was  spread  around  him :  it  breathed  from  his  face,  and 
was  diffused  over  all  that  he  said  and  did.  His  eyes  twinkled 
with  the  pride  of  authority.  His  brow  assumed  by  anticipation 
the  solemnity  of  the  judicial  cast;  he  seemed  to  rehearse  the 
part  of  Chief  Justice,  and  to  be  already  half  seated  on  the 
highest  place  upon  the  Bench.  But  suddenly  it  was  plucked 
from  beneath  him.  Lord  Wellesley  arrived*  —  Saurin  was  pre- 
cipitated from  his  office.  In  a  paroxysm  of  distempered  magna- 
nimity he  disdained  to  accept  the  first  judicial  station ;  and 
Bushe,  to  his  own  astonishment,  grasped  in  permanence  and 
security  that  object  of  half  his  life,  which  had  appeared  so 
long  to  fly  from  his  pursuit,  and,  just  before  the  instant  of  its 
attainment,  seemed,  like  a  phantasm,  to  have  receded  from  his 
reach  for  ever.  Bushe  is  now  Chief-Justice  of  the  King's 
Bench    [1823J ;   and  that   he    may  long    continue  to    preside 

*  As  Lord-Lieutenant  of  Ireland.  After  the  visit  of  George  IV.,  when  the 
Catholics  showed  a  superabundance  of"  loyalty,"  it  was  resolved  to  favor  them 
with  a  more  liberal  ruler  than  the  late  Earl  Talbot,  who  was  a  decided  partisan 
of  "  Protestant  Ascendency  in  Church  and  State."  The  Marquis  Wellesley 
was  sent  over  —  partly  because  he  was  liberal  and  friendly  to  the  Catholic 
claims,  and  partly  because  he  was  poor,  and  the  twenty  thousand  pounds  ster- 
ling a  year  salary  was  an  object  to  him.  At  tbe  same  time,  Mr.  Saurin,  the 
virtual  and  intolerant  ruler  of  the  country,  was  dismissed,  to  be  succeeded  by 
Plunket,  the  eloquent  advocate  of  Emancipation.  —  Lord  Wellesley  in  Ireland 
forms  the  subject  of  a  lively  sketch,  in  this  volume,  entitled  "  The  Dublin  Tab- 
let Ball,"—  VI. 


AS   SOLICITOR   GENERAL.  179 

there,  is  the  wish  of  every  man  by  whom  indiscriminate  urban- 
ity to  the  bar,  unremitting  attention  to  the  duties  of  his  office, 
and  a  perfect  competence  to  their  discharge  —  the  purest  im- 
partiality and  a  most  noble  intellect  —  are  held  in  value. 

Notwithstanding  that  the  Bench  was  withdrawn  from  Mr. 
Joy,  while  he  was  almost  in  the  attitude  of  seating  himself 
upon  it,  he  did  not  fall  to  the  ground.  Bushe's  promotion  left 
a  vacancy  in  the  office  of  Solicitor-General,  and  it  was  ten- 
dered to  Mr.  Joy.  This  was  considered  a  little  singular,  as 
his  opinions  were  well  known  to  be  exactly  opposite  to  those 
of  the  new  Attorn ey-Greneral,  Mr.  Plunket.  That  circum- 
stance, however,  so  far  from  being  a  ground  of  objection,  was, 
I  am  inclined  to  think,  a  principal  motive  for  submitting  the 
vacant  place  to  his  acceptance.  It  had  been  resolved  to 
compound  all  parties  together.  The  more  repulsive  the  ingre- 
dients, the  better  fitted  they  were  for  the  somewhat  empirical 
process  of  conciliation,  with  which  Lord  Wellesley  had  under- 
taken to  mix  them  up  together.  The  government  being  itself  an 
anomaly  —  a  thing  "of  shreds  and  patches"  —  it  was  only 
consistent  that  the  legal  department  should  be  equally  hete- 
rogeneous. To  this  sagacious  project,  the  conjunction  of  two 
persons  who  differ  so  widely  from  each  other  as  Mr.  Plunket 
and  Mr.  Joy,  is  to  be  attributed.  The  latter  was  blamed  by 
many  of  his  friends  for  the  promptitude  with  which  he  allied 
himself  to  the  new  administration,  for  he  did  not  affect  the 
coyness  which  is  usually  illustrated  by  a  proverbial  reference 
to  clerical  ambition.  He  was  well  aware  that  if  he  indulged 
in  the  mockery  of  a  refusal,  amid  the  rapid  fluctuations  of  an 
undecided  government,  he  might  endanger  the  ultimate  pos- 
session of  so  valuable  an  office.  He  did  not  put  on  any 
virgin  reluctances,  nor  seem  "  fearful  of  his  wishes,"  but  em- 
braced the  fair  opportunity  with  a  genuine  and  unaffected 
at  dor. 

Mr.  Joy  is  justly  accounted  one  of  the  ablest  men  at  the  Irish 
Bar.  In  the  sense  in  which  eloquence,  and  especially  in  Ireland; 
is  generally  understood,  I  do  not  think  that  it  belongs  to  him 
in  a  very  remarkable  degree.  At  times  his  manner  is  very 
strenuous,  but  energy  is  by  no  means  the  characteristic  of  his 


|80  HENRY    JOY. 

speaking.     I  have  seen  him,  upon  occasion,  appeal  to  juries 
with  considerable  force,  and  manifest  that  honest  indignation 
in  the  reprobation   of  meanness  and  of  depravity,  which   is 
always  sure  to  excite  an  exalted  sentiment  in  the  minds  of 
men.     The  sincere  enforcement  of  good  principle  is  among  the 
noblest  sources  of  genuine  oratory  ;   and  he  that  awakens  a 
more  generous  love  of  virtue  and  lifts  us  beyond  the  ordinary 
sphere  of  our  moral  sensibilities,  produces  the  true  results  of 
eloquence.     This  Mr.  Joy  has  not  unfrequently  accomplished, 
but  his  habitual  cast  of  expression  and  of  thought  is  too  much 
subdued  and   kept  under  the  vigilant  control  of  a  timid  and 
suspicious   taste,   to   be    attended    with   any   very  signal  and 
shining  effects.     He  deals  little  in  that  species  of  illustration 
which  indicates  a  daring  and   adventurous  mind  ;  that  seeks 
to  deliver  its  strong,  though  not  always  matured,  conceptions 
in  bold  and  lofty  phrase.     Its  products  may  be  frequently  im- 
perfect, but  a  single  noble  thought  that  springs  full  formed 
from  the  imagination,  compensates  for- all  it's  abortive  offspring. 
Mr.  Joy  does  not  appear  to  think  so,  and  studiously  abstains 
from  the  indulgenceof  that  propensity  to  figurative  decoration, 
which  in  Ireland  is  carried  to  some  excess.     Nature,  I  suspect, 
has  been  a  little  niggard  in  the  endowment  of  his  fancy ;  and 
if  she  has  not  given  him  wings  for  a  sustained  and  lofty  flight, 
he  is  wise  in  not  using  any  waxen  pinions.     I  have  never  de- 
tected any  exaggeration  in  his  speeches,  either  in  notion  or  in 
phrase.     His  language  is  precise  and  pure,  but  so   simple  as 
scarcely  to  deviate  from  the  plainness  of  ordinary  discourse. 

It  was  observed  of  Lysias  that  he  seldom  employed  a  word 
which  was  not  in  the  most  common  use,  but  that  his  language 
was  so  measured  as  to  render  his  style  exceedingly  melodious 
and  sweet.  Mr.  Joy  very  rarely  has  recourse  to  an  expression 
which  is  not  perfectly  familiar.  But  he  combines  the  most 
trivial  forms  of  phrase  with  so  much  art  together,  as  to  give 
them  a  peculiarly  rhythmical  construction.  Upon  occasion, 
however,  he  throws  into  a  speech  some  ornamental  allusion  to 
his  own  favorite  pursuits.  He  takes  a  flower  or  two  from  his 
hortus  siccus,  and  flings  it  carelessly  out.  But  his  images  are 
derived  from  the  museum  and  the  cabinet,  and   not  from  th? 


HIS    SCIENTIFIC   PURSUITS.  181 

mountain  and  the  field.  He  is  strongly  addicted  to  the  study 
of  the  more  graceful  sciences,  and  versed  in  shrubs,  and  birds, 
and  butterflies. 

In  this  respect  he  stands  an  honorable  exception  to  most  of 
the  eminent  members  of  the  Bar,  with  whom  all  scientific  and 
literary  acquirement  is  held  in  a  kind  of  disrepute.  Mr.  Joy 
has  not  neglected  those  sources  of  permanent  enjoyment,  which 
continue  to  administer  their  innocent  gratifications,  when  al- 
most every  other  is  dried  up.  He  has  employed  his  solitary 
leisure  (for  he  is  an  old  bachelor,  and  appears  to  be  an  invet- 
erate Mr.  Oldbuck)  in  the  cultivation  of  elegant,  although,  in 
some  instances,  fantastic  tastes.  He  is  devoted  to  the  loves 
of  the  plants,  and  spends  in  a  well-assorted  museum  of  curiosi- 
ties many  an  hour  of  dalliance  with  an  insect  or  a  shell.  It  is 
not  unnatural  that  his  mind  should  be  impregnated  with  his 
intellectual  recreations ;  and  whenever  he  ventures  upon  a 
metaphor,  it  may  readily  be  traced  to  some  association  with 
his  scientific  pursuits. 

With  this  rare  exception,  Mr.  Joy  may  be  accounted  an  un- 
adorned speaker.  His  chief  merit  consists  in  his  talent  for 
elucidation  and  for  sneering.  He  is,  indeed,  so  sensible  of  his 
genius  for  mockery,  that  he  puts  it  into  use  wherever  the  least 
opportunity  is  afforded  for  its  display.  When  it  is  his  object 
to  cover  a  man  with  disgrace,  he  lavishes  encomium  with  a 
tone  and  a  look  that  render  his  envenomed  praises  more  deadly 
than  the  fiercest  invective.  He  deals  in  incessant  irony,  and 
sets  off  his  virulent  panegyric  with  a  smile  of  such  baleful  de- 
rision as  to  furnish  a  model  to  a  painter  for  Goethe's  Metemp- 
syphiles.*  In  cross-examination  he  employs  this  formidable 
faculty  with  singular  effect. 

Here  he  shows  high  excellence.  He  contemplates  the  wit- 
ness with  the  suppressed  delight  of  an  inquisitor,  who  calmly 
surveys  his  victim  before  he  has  him  on  the  wheel.  He  does 
not  drag  him  to  the  torture  with  a  ferocious  precipitation,  and 
throw  him  at  once  into  his  torments,  but  with  a  slowr  and  bland- 
ishing suavity  tempts  and  allures  him  on,  and  invites  him  to 
the  point  at  which  he  knows  that  the  means  of  infliction  lie 

*  Mephistophilcs  ?  —  M. 


182  tiEtfitY  JOt. 

iii  wait.  He  offers  him  a  soft  and  downy  bed  in  wliicli  the 
rack  is  concealed,  and  when  lie  is  laid  upon  it,  even  tlien  he 
does  not  put  out  all  his  resources  of  agony  at  once.  He  affects 
to  caress  the  victim  whom  he  torments,  and  it  is  only  after  he 
has  brought  the  whole  machinery  of  torture  into  action,  that 
his  purpose  is  perfectly  revealed ;  and  even  then,  and  when  he  is 
in  the  fullest  triumph  of  excruciation,  he  retains  his  seeming 
and  systematic  gentleness ;  he  affects  to  wonder  at  the  pain 
which  he  applies,  and  while  he  is  pouring  molten  lead  into 
the  wound,  pretends  to  think  it  balm. 

The  habitual  irony  which  Mr.  Joy  is  accustomed  to  put  into 
such  efficient  practice,  has  given  an  expression  to  his  face 
which  is  peculiarly  sardonic.  Whatever  mutations  his  coun- 
tenance undergoes,  are  but  varied  modifications  of  a  sneer. 
It  exhibits  in  every  aspect  a  phasis  of  disdain.  Plunket's 
face  sins  a  little  in  this  regard,  but  its  expression  is  less  con- 
temptuous than  harsh.  There  is  in  it  more  of  the  acidity  of 
ill  humor  than  of  the  bitterness  of  scorn.  His  pride  appears 
to  result  rather  from  the  sense  of  his  own  endowments  than 
from  any  depreciating  reference  to  those  of  other  men.  But 
the  mockery  of  Mr.  Joy  is  connected  with  all  the  odium  of 
comparison  :  — 

"  Et  les  deux  bras  crois6s,  du  haut  de  son  esprit, 
II  6coute  en  pitie  tout  ce  que  chacun  dit." 

The  features  upon  which  this  perpetual  derision  is  inlaid, 
are  of  a  peculiar  cast;  —  they  are  rough-hewn  and  unclassical, 
and  dispersed  over  a  square  and  rectangular  visage,  without 
symmetry  or  arrangement.  His  mouth  is  cut  broadly,  and 
directly  from  one  jaw  to  the  other,  and  has  neither  richness 
nor  curve.  There  are  in  his  cheeks  two  deep  cavities,  which 
in  his  younger  days  might  have  possibly  passed  for  dimples, 
hollowed  out  in  the  midst  of  yellow  flesh.  Here  it  is  that 
Ridicule  seems  to  have  chosen  her  perpetual  residence,  for  T  do 
not  remember  to  have  seen  her  give  way  to  any  more  kindly 
or  gentle  sentiment.  His  nose  is  broad  at  the  root ;  its  nostrils 
are  distended,  and  it  terminates  in  an  ascending  point :  but 
it  is  too  short  for  profile,  and  lies  in  a  side  view  almost  con- 
reale  3  jn  the  folds  of  parchment  by  which  it  is  encompassed, 


HIS    PHYSIOGNOMY.  183 

The  eyes  are  dark,  bright,  and  intellectual,  but  the  lids  are 
shrivelled  and  pursed  up  in  such  a  manner,  and  seemingly  by 
an  act  of  will,  as  to  leave  but  a  small  space  between  their 
contracted  rims  for  the  gleams  of  vision  that  are  permitted  to 
escape.  They  seem  to  insinuate  that  it  is  not  worth  their 
while  to  be  open,  in  order  to  survey  the  insignificant  object  on 
which  they  may  chance  to  light.  The  forehead  is  thoughtful 
and  high,  but  from  the  posture  of  the  head,  which  is  thrown 
back  and  generally  aside,  it  appropriately  surmounts  this 
singular  assemblage  of  features,  and  lends  an  important  con- 
tribution to  the  sardonic  effect  of  the  whole. 

His  deportment  is  in  keeping  with  his  physiognomy.  If  the 
reader  will  suggest  to  his  imagination  the  figure  of  a  Mandarin, 
receiving  Lord  Amherst*  at  the  palace  at  Pekin,  and  with 

*  The  British  Government,  always  anxious  to  establish  intimate  commercial 
and  political  relations  with  China,  despatched  Lord  Macartney,  at  the  head  of 
a  special  Embassy,  in  1792.  He  and  his  suite  reached  China  the  following 
year,  were  received  there,  with  all  courtesy  as  "  tribute-bearers,"  and  were 
promised  an  audience  of  the  Emperor,  provided  they  would  perform  the  usual 
prostrations  of  the  person  made  in  the  presence  of  his  Majesty  by  his  own  sub- 
jects. This  was  declined,  but  Lord  Macartney  finally  offered  to  perform  the 
Kou-to  (as  it  is  called)  if  some  high  officer  of  state  would  previously  do  like 
homage  before  a  portrait  of  George  III.  Lord  Macartney  and  Sir  George 
Staunton  actually  had  the  promised  audience,  each  kneeling  on  one  knee  as 
they  presented  the  Emperor  with  a  magnificent  gold  box,  richly  adorned  with 
jewels,  which  contained  the  King  of  England's  letter,  which,  with  other  pres- 
ents, was  well  received,  and  the  return  of  the  embassy  requested.  In  1816, 
Lord  Amherst  headed  a  second  embassy,  and  strongly  declined  making  the 
required  nine  prostrations  to  the  Emperor,,  declaring  he  would  pay  him  the 
same  homage  as  he  yielded  to  his  own  sovereign,  and  no  more  —  unless  a  Tar- 
tar mandarin  of  rank  would  perform  the  Ko-tou  before  the  portrait  of  the  Eng- 
lish ruler.  Finally,  on  the  Emperor's  declaration  that  Lord  Macartney  had. 
Ko-toued  on  the  former  occasion,  Lord  Amherst  agreed  to  do  the  same  —  but 
the  Embassy  was  literally  hurried  out  of  the  country,  to  their  ships  on  the  coast, 
before  this  could  be  done.  A  reply  to  the  Royal  letter  from  England  pompously 
intimated  that  it  would  not  again  be  necessary  to  send  "  a  tribute-bearer" from 
such  a  distance.  The  two  embassies  cost  about  three  hundred  and  fifty  thou- 
sand pounds  sterling.  Napoleon  (who  was  visited  at  St  Helena  by  Lord  Am- 
herst, on  his  return  from  China),  said  he  should  have  complied  with  the  cus- 
toms of  the  place,  or  not  have  been  sent  at  all,  for  that  what  the  chief  men  of 
a  nation  practise  toward  their  chief,  could  not  degrade  strangers  to  prac- 
tise.—  M. 


184  HENRY   JOT. 

contemptuous  courtesy  proposing  to  Lis  lordship  the  ceremony 
of  the  Ko-tou,  he  will  form  a  pretty  accurate  notion  of  the 
bearing,  the  manners,  and  the  hue  of  Mr.  Joy,  his  Majesty's 
Solicitor-General  for  Ireland.  He  is  extremely  polite,  but  his 
politeness  is  as  Chinese  as  his  look,  and  appears  to  be  dic- 
tated rather  by  a  sense  of  what  he  owes  to  himself  than  by 
any  deference  to  the  person  who  has  the  misfortune  to  be  its 
object. 

And  yet  with  all  this  assumption  of  dignity,  Mr.  Joy  is  not 
precisely  dignified.  He  is  in  a  perpetual  effort  to  sustain  nis 
consequence,  and  arms  himself  against  the  least  invasion  upon 
his  title  to  respect.  Of  its  legitimacy,  however,  he  does  not 
appear  to  be  completely  satisfied.  He  seems  a  spy  upon  his 
own  importance,  and  keeps  watch  over  the  sacred  treasure 
with  a  most  earnest  and  unremitting  vigilance.  Accord- 
ingly, he  is  for  ever  busy  with  himself.  There  is  nothing  ab- 
stract and  meditative  in  his  aspect,  nor  does  his  mind  ever 
wander  beyond  the  immediate  localities  that  surround  him. 
There  is  "  no  speculation  in  his  eye ;"  an  intense  conscious- 
ness pervades  all  that  he  says  and  does.  I  never  yet  saw  him 
lost  in  re  very. 

When  disengaged  from  his  professional  occupations,  he 
stands  in  the  Hall  with  the  same  collected  manner  which  he 
bore  in  the  discharge  of  his  duties  to  his  client,  and  with  his 
thoughts  fastened  to  the  spot.  While  others  are  pacing  with 
rapidity  along  the  flags  which  have  worn  out  so  many  hopes, 
Joy  remains  in  stationary  stateliness,  peering  with  a  sidelong 
look  at  the  peristrephic  panorama  that  revolves  around  him. 
The  whole,  however,  of  what  is  going  on  is  referred  to  his  own 
individuality  ;  self  is  the  axis  of  the  little  world  about  him, 
and  while  he  appears  scarcely  conscious  of  the  presence  of  a 
single  person  in  all  the  crowd  by  which  he  is  encompassed,  he 
is  in  reality  noting  down  the  slightest  glance  that  may  be  con- 
nected with  himself. 

There  is  something  so  artificial  in  the  demeanor  of  Mr.  Joy, 
and  especially  in  the  authoritativeness  which  he  assumes  with 
the  official  silk  in  which  he  attires  his  person,  that  his  external 
appearance  gives  but  little  indication  of  his  character.     His 


AS    A   JUDGE.  185 

dispositions  are  much  more  commendable  than  a  disciple  of 
Lavatcr  would  be  inclined  to  surmise.  I  suspect  that  his  hau- 
teur is  worn  from  a  conviction  that  the  vulgar  are  most  inclined 
to  reverence  the  man  by  whom  they  are  most  strenuously  de- 
spised. Upon  a  view  of  Mr.  Joy,  it  would  be  imagined  that 
he  would  not  prove  either  a  very  humane  or  patient  judge;* 
but  it  is  quite  otherwise,  and  those  who  have  had  an  opportu- 
nity of  observing  him  in  a  judicial  capacity  upon  circuit,  con- 
cur in  the  desire  that  he  should  be  permanently  placed  in  a 
situation  for  which  he  has  already  displayed  in  its  transitory 
occupation  so  many  conspicuous  qualities. 

*  Chief-Baron  Joy  was  a  good  judge  ;  —  sound  in  his  law,  impartial  io  fail 
judgments,  and  courteous  in  his  demeanor.  —  M. 


CALAMITIES   OF   THE   BAR. 

Not  very  long  after  I  had  been  called  to  the  bar,  I  one  day 
chanced  to  observe  a  person  standing  beside  a  pillar  in  the  Hall 
of  the  Four  Courts,  the  peculiar  wretchedness  of  whose  aspect 
attracted  my  notice.  I  was  upon  my  way  to  the  subterranean 
chamber  where  the  wigs  and  gowns  of  lawyers  are  kept,  and 
was  revolving  at  the  moment  the  dignity  and  importance  of 
the  station  to  which  I  had  Jbeen  raised  by  my  enrolment  among 
the  members  of  the  Irish  bar.  I  was  interrupted  in  this  inter- 
esting meditation  by  the  miserable  object  upon  which  my  eyes 
had  happened  to  rest;  and,  without  being  a  dilettante  in  afflic- 
tion, I  could  not  help  pausing  to  consider  the  remarkable  spe- 
cimen of  wretchedness  that  stood  before  me. 

Had  the  unfortunate  man  been  utterly  naked,  his  condition 
would  not  have  appeared  so  pitiable.  His  raiment  served  to 
set  his  destitution  off.  A  coat,  which  had  once  been  black,  but 
which  appeared  to  have  been  steeped  in  a  compound  of  all  rusty 
hues,  hung  in  rags  about  him.  It  was  closely  pinned  at  his 
throat,  to  conceal  the  absence  of  a  neckcloth.  He  was  without 
a  vest.  A  shirt  of  tattered  yellow,  which  from  a  time  beyond 
memory  had  adhered  to  his  withered  body,  appeared  through 
numerous  apertures  in  his  upper  garment,  and  jutted  out  round 
that  portion  of  his  person  where  a  garb  without  a  name  is  usu- 
ally attached.  The  latter  part  of*  his  attire,  which  was  con- 
spicuous for  a  prismatic  diversity  of  color,  was  fastened  with  a 
piece  of  twine  to  the  extreme  button  of  his  upper  habiliment, 
and  very  incompletely  supplied  the  purpose  for  which  the  pro- 
genitors of  mankind,  after  their  first  initiation  into  knowledge, 
employed  a  vegetable  veil.     Through  the  inferior  regions  of 


AN   UNFORTUNATE   LAWYER.  18? 

this  imperfect,  integument,  there  depended  a  shred  or  two  of 
that  inner  garment,  which  had  been  long  sacred  to  nastiness, 
and  which  the  fingers  of  the  laundress  never  had  profaned. 
His  stockings  were  compounded  of  ragged  worsted  and  accu- 
mulated mire.  They  covered  a  pair  of  fleshless  bones,  hut  did 
not  extend  to  the  feet,  the  squalid  nakedness  of  which  was 
visible  through  the  shoes  that  hung  soaked  with  wet  about 
them. 

He  was  dripping  with  rain,  and  shivering  with  cold.  His 
figure  was  shrunken  and  diminutive.  A  few  gray  locks  were 
wildly  scattered  upon  a  small  and  irregularly-shaped  head. 
Despair  and  famine  sat  upon  his  face,  which  was  of  the  strong 
Celtic  mould,  with  its  features  thrown  in  disorder,  and  desti- 
tute of  all  symmetry  or  proportion,  but  deriving  from  the  pas- 
sions, by  which  they  were  distorted,  an  expression  of  ferocious 
haggardness.  His  beard  was  like  that  which  grows  upon  the 
dead.  The  flesh  was  of  a  cadaverous  complexion.  His  gray 
eyes,  although  laden  with  rheum,  caught  a  savageness  from 
the  eyelids,  which  were  bordered  with  a  jagged  rim  of  diseased 
and  bloody  red.  A  hideous  mouth  was  lined  with  a  row  of 
shattered  ebony,  and  from  the  instinct  of  long  hunger  had  ac- 
quired an  habitual  gape  for  food.  The  wretched  man  was 
speaking  vehemently  and  incoherently  to  himself.  It  was  a 
sort  of  insane  jabbering — a  mad  soliloquy,  in  which  "my 
Lord"  was  frequently  repeated. 

I  turned  away  with  a  mingled  sentiment  of  disgust  and  hor- 
ror, and,  endeavoring  to  release  my  recollection  from  the  pain- 
ful image  which  so  frightful  an  object  had  left  behind,  I  pro- 
ceeded to  invest  myself  in  my  professional  trappings :  tied  a 
band  with  precision  about  my  neck  ;  complained,  as  is  the  wont 
with  the  junior  bar,  that  my  wig  had  not  been  duly  besprinkled 
with  powder,  and  that  its  curls  were  not  developed  with  suffi- 
cient amplitude;  set  it  rectilinearly  upon  my  head;  and,  after 
casting  a  look  into  the  glass,  and  marking  the  judicial  organ 
in  a  certain  prominence  upon  my  brow,  I  readjusted  the  folds 
of  my  gown,  and  reascended  the  Hall  of  the  Four  Courts  in  a 
pleasurable  state  of  unqualified  contentedness  with  myself. 

I  directed  my  steps  to  the  Court  of  Chancery,  and,  having 


188  CALAMITIES   OF   THE   £AiS. 

no  better  occupation,  I  determined  to  follow  the  example  of 
certain  sagacious  aspirants  to  the  office  of  Commissioner  of 
Bankrupts,  and  to  dedicate  the  day  to  an  experiment  in  nod- 
ding, which  I  had  seen  put  into  practice  with  effect.  There 
are  a  set  of  juvenile  gentlemen  who  have  taken  for  their  mottt 
the  words  of  a  Scotch  ballad,  which,  upon  a  recent  motion  foi 
an  injunction,  Lord  Eldon*  affected  not  to  understand,  bu1 
which,  if  he  had  looked  for  a  moment  upon  the  benches  ot 
youthful  counsellors  before  him,  while  in  the  act  of  delivering 
a  judicial  aphorism,  he  would  have  found  interpreted  in  one 
of  the  senses  of  which  they  are  susceptible,  and  have  discov- 
ered a  meaning  in  "  We're  all  a-nodding,"  of  obvious  applica- 
tion to  the  bar.  Confident  in  the  flexibility  of  my  neck,  and 
a  certain  plastic  facility  of  expression,  I  imagined  that  I  was 
not  without  some  talent  for  assentation  ;  and  accordingly  seated 
myself  in  such  a  place  that  the  eye  of  my  Lord  Manners,  in 
seeking  refuge  from  the  inquisitorial  physiognomy  of  Mr. 
Plunket,  would  probably  rest  upon  me. 

The  Court  began  to  fill.  The  young  aristocracy  of  the  bar, 
the  sons  of  Judges,  and  fifth  cousins  of  members  of  Parliament, 
and  the  whole  rising  generation  of  the  Kildare-street  Club, 
gradually  dropped  in.  Next  appeared,  at  the  inner  bar,  the 
more  eminent  practitioners  tottering  under  their  huge  bags, 
upon  which  many  a  briefless  senior  threw  a  mournful  and  re- 
pining glance.      First  came  Mr.  Pennefather,f  with  his  calm 

*  Lord- Chancellor  Eldon,  although  born  close  to  the  Scottish  border,  affected 
not  to  understand  the  Scotch  dialect  and  pronunciation.  He  was  once  hearing 
appeals,  in  the  House  of  Lords,  and  Mr.  Clerk,  an  eminent  Edinburgh  lawyer 
(afterward  a  Judge,  and  called  Lord  Eldin),  having  said,  in  his  broadest  ac- 
cent, "  In  plain  English,  nay  Lords,"  was  interrupted,  half-seriously,  by  Lord 
Eldon,  with  —  "In  plain  Scotch,  I  suppose  you  mean?"  — "  Nae  matter,"  re- 
joined Clerk,  "in  plain  common  sense,  my  Lord  —  and  that's  the  same  in  all 
languages  —  ye '11  ken  if  you  understand  it."  —  M. 

t  There  were  two  Lish  barristers  named  Pennefather.  Edward,  the  junior, 
called  to  the  bar  in  1796,  was  inferior  to  none  as  a  lawyer  and  an  advocate. 
He  had  immense  practice ;  and  though  compelled,  by  ill-health,  occasionally  to 
retire  from  labor,  attorneys  would  flock  to  him  with  briefs  the  moment  he  re- 
turned. 1 1  this  respect  he  was  as  fortunate  as  the  late  Sir  William  Follett,  of 
the  English  bar,  and  both  negatived  the  commonly-received  belief  that  "  when 
E  lawyer  leaves  his  business,  his  business  leaves  him."     Edward  Pennefathei 


THE    PAUPER   BARRISTER.  189 

and  unruffled  forehead,  his  flushed  cheek,  and  his  subtilizing 
and  somewhat  over-anxious  eye.  He  was  succeeded  by  Mr. 
Sergeant  Lefroy,  who  after  casting  a  smile  of  pious  recognition 
upon  a  brace  of  neophytes  behind,  rolled  out  a  ponderous  brief, 
and  reluctantly  betook  himself  to  the  occupations  of  this  sub- 
lunary world.  Next  came  Mr.  Blackburne,*  with  his  smug  fea- 
tures, but  beaming  and  wily  eye;  Mr.  Crampton,f  with  an  air 
of  elaborated  frankness ;  Mr.  Warren,!  with  an  expression  of 
atrabilious  honesty  ;  Mr.  Saurin,  looking  as  if  he  had  never 
been  Attorney-General ;  and  Mr.  Plunket,  as  if  he  never  could 
cease  to  be  so.  Lastly  appeared  my  Lord  Manners,  with  that 
strong  affinity  to  the  Stuart  cast  of  face,  and  that  fine  urbanity 
of  manner,  which,  united  with  a  sallow  face  and  a  meagre  figure, 
makes  him  seem  like  the  phantom  of  Charles  II. 

The  Court  was  crowded,  the  business  of  the  day  was  called 
on;  Mr.  Prendergast,||  with  that  depth  of  registerial  intonation 
which  belongs  to  him,  had  called  on  the  first  cause,  when  sud- 
denly a  cry,  or  rather  an  Irish  howl,  of  "My  Lord,  my  Lord," 
rose  from  the  remote  seats  of  the  Court,  and  made  the  whole 
assembly  look  back.  A  barrister  in  a  wig  and  gown  was  seen 
clambering  from  bench  to  bench,  and  upsetting  all  opposition, 
rolling  over  some  and  knocking  down  others,  and  uttering  in 
a  vehement  and  repeated  ejaculation,  "My  Lord,  my  Lord," 
as  he  advanced,  or  rather  tumbled  over  every  impediment.    At 

was  offered  the  office  of  Lord-Chancellor  of  Ireland  in  1841,  when  Sugden  was 
in  doubt  about  accepting  it,  and  became  Solicitor-General  only  on  a  promise 
that  he  should  have  the  next  Chief- Justiceship  vacancy.  That  was  of  the 
Queen's  Bench,  in  which  capacity  he  presided  at  the  O'Connell  State-Trials  in 
1843-'4.  He  was  then  seventy  years  of  age,  and  did  not  long  survive.  —  Rich- 
ard Pennefather,  called  to  the  bar  in  1795,  is  now  (1854)  one  of  the  pitism 
Barons  of  the  Exchequer  in  Ireland.  —  M. 

*  Late  Lord-Chancellor  of  Ireland,  in  1852,  under  the  Derby-D'Israeli  Min- 
istry, and  the  subject  of  a  later  sketch.  —  M. 

t  Now  (1854)  one  of  the  Judges  of  the  Court  of  Queen's  Bench  in  Ire- 
land.—  M. 

t  Mr.  Wan-en,  without  any  remarkable  brilliancy  or  depth,  has  obtained  high 
credit  and  large  practice  at  the  Irish  bar.  He  was  made  a  Sergeant-at-Law, 
and  pleaded  for  the  Crown,  at  the  State-Trials  of  1843-'4.  —  M. 

||  Registrar  of  the  Irish  Court  of  Chancery  under  Lord  Manners,  Ho  hus 
long  riijce  passed  away.  —  M, 


190  CALAMITIES    OF   THE    BAR. 

length  lie  readied  the  lower  bench,  where  he  remained  breath- 
less for  a  moment,  overcome  by  the  exertion  which  he  had 
made  to  gain  that  prominent  station  in  the  court.  The  first 
sensation  was  one  of  astonishment ;  this  was  succeeded  by  reit- 
erated laughter,  which  even  the  strictness  of  Chancery  etiquette 
could  not  restrain.  I  could  not  for  a  moment  believe  the  assu- 
rance of  my  senses,  until,  looking  at  him  again  and  again,  I 
became  satisfied  that  this  strange  barrister  (for  a  barrister  it 
was)  was  no  other  than  the  miserable  man  whom  I  had  ob- 
served in  the  Hall,  and  of  whom  I  have  given  a  faint  and  im- 
perfect picture. 

After  the  roar  of  ridicule  had  subsided,  the  unfortunate  gen- 
tleman received  an  intimation  from  Lord  Manners  that  he 
should  be  heard  —  when  he  addressed  the  court  in  a  speech, 
of  the  style  of  delivery  of  which  it  is  impossible  to  convey  to 
an  English  reader  any  adequate  notion,  but  which  ran  to  the 
following  effect:  "It  is  now,  may  it  please  your  honorable 
Lordship,  more  than  forty  years,  since,  with  a  mournful  step 
and  a  heavy  heart,  I  followed  the  remains  of  your  Lordship's 
illustrious  relative,  the  Duke  of  Rutland,*  to  the  grave."     The 

*  Charles  Manners,  fourth  Duke  of  Rutland,  born  in  1754,  was  appointed 
Lord-Lieutenant  of  L'eland  in  1784,  and  died,  while  in  office,  in  October,  1787, 
at  the  early  age  of  thirty-three.  He  was  cousin  {three  removed)  to  Luid-Chan- 
cellor  Manners.  He  was  a  bon-vivant,  and  a  man  of  pleasure.  In  the  former 
capacity  he  was  entertained  by  the  Mayor  of  Cork,  and,  happening  to  praise 
some  wine  which  was  making1  the  circuit  of  the  board,  was  rather  astounded 
at  the  Mayor's  cool  reply  :  "  Well,  my  Lord  Duke,  it  is  good  claret,  but  nothing 
to  be  compared  with  a  better  quality  in  my  cellar!"  This  Viceroy  h  was  who, 
in  a  convivial  moment,  "  when  the  wine  was  in,"  insisted  on  knighting  the 
landlord  of  the  country  inn  at  which  he  happened  to  be  stopping.  The  next 
morning,  he  endeavored  to  pass  it  off*  as  a  joke,  and,  giving  the  landlord  a 
handful  of  guineas,  said,  "  Pat,  you  must  not  mind  what  passed  last  night ; 
twas  all  a  joke."  Carefully  pocketing  the  gold,  the  beknighted  landlord  made 
hie  best  bow,  and  said,  "As  to  that,  your  Excellency,  'tis  all  one  to  me  —  but 
what  will  Lady  O' 'Shaughiessy  say  ?"  To  his  dying  day,  therefore,  he  contin- 
ued to  be  called  Sir  Patrick  O'Shaughnessy.  The  Duke  of  Rutland  was  in  the 
habit  of  visiting  certain  houses  and  persons  of  not  quite  the  purest  reputation. 
In  his  time,  there  was  a  handsome  profligate,  named  Peg  Plunket,  who  was 
presumed,  and  not  untruly  (as  all  accounts  declare),  to  be  very  particularly  in 
his  Grace's  good  graces  —  whatever  these  may  have  been.  At  the  theatre,  ona 
evening,  this  fair  and  frail  one  made  her  appearance,  and  the  wags  called  out? 


A   STRANG  E   ORATION  101 

moment  this  sentence  had  been  pronounced,  and  it  was  uttered 
with  a  barbarous  impressiveness,  the  Chancellor  leaned  for- 
ward, and  assumed  an  aspect  of  profound  attention.*  The  bar 
immediately  composed  their  features  into  sympathy  with  tho 
judicial  countenance,  and  a  general  expression  of  compassion 
pervaded  the  court. 

The  extraordinary  orator  continued:  "Yes,  my  Lord,  the 
unfortunate  man  who  stands  before  you,  did,  as  a  scholar  of 
Trinity  College,  attend  the  funeral-procession  with  which  the 
members  of  the  University  of  Dublin  followed  the  relics  of 
your  noble  relative  to  an  untimely  tomb.  My  eyes,  my  Lord, 
are  now  filled  by  my  own  calamities,  but  they  were  then  moist- 
ened by  that  sorrow,  which,  in  common  with  the  whole  of  the 
loyal  part  of  the  Irish  nation  (for,  my  Lord,  I  am  a  Protestant), 
I  felt  for  the  loss  of  your  noble  and  ever-to-be-lamented  kins- 
man." (The  bar  looked  up  to  Lord  Manners,  and,  perceiving 
his  Lordship's  attention  still  more  strongly  riveted,  preserved 
their  gravity.)  "  Oh,  my  Lord,  I  feel  that  I  am  addressing 
myself  to  a  man  who  carries  a  true  nobleness  of  sentiment  in 
every  drop  of  his  honorable  blood.  God  Almighty  bless  your 
Lordship  !  you  belong,  ay,  every  bit  of  you,  to  the  noble  house 
of  Rutland;  and  aren't  you  the  uncle  of  a  Duke,  and  the 
brother  of  his  Grace  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  V* 
"  But  in  what  cause,  Mr.  M'Mahon,  are  you  counsel  ?" 
"  In  my  own,  my  Lord.     It  is  a  saying,  my  Lord,  that  he 

"Ah,  Peg  !  who  passed  last  night  with  you,  Peg  ?"  At  that  moment  the  Duke 
of  Rutland,  whose  family  name  was  Manners,  entered  the  vice-regal  box,  ac- 
companied by  his  young  and  lovely  wife.  Peg,  turning  round  to  her  querists, 
with  a  sly  look  at  the  Duke,  exclaimed,  "  Manners  !  you  blackguards  !"  The 
whole  audience  burst  into  a  shout  of  laughter,  in  which  the  Duke  himself  could 
not  help  joining.  History  does  not  record  what  was  the  Duchess's  opinion  of 
the  reply,  retort,  and  occasion!  —  M. 

*  Lord  Manners  was  not  uncle  of  a  Duke.  His  father,  Lord  George  Man- 
ners, son  of  the  third  Duke  of  Rutland,  on  succeeding  to  the  estates  of  his  ma- 
ternal grandfather,  Lord  Lexington,  whose  family  name  was  Sutton,  assumed 
that  surname.  He  was  only  cousin,  at  some  distance,  too,  from  the  Duke  of 
Rutland.  His  elder  brother,  Charles  Manners  Sutton,  bom  in  1755,  became 
Archbishop  of  Cantei'bury,  and  died  in  July,  1828.  The  Archbishop's  eldest 
son,  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Commons  for  seventeen  years,  was  created  Vid- 
pount  Canterbury,  in  1835. —  M. 


192  CALAMITIES    OF   THE   BAR. 

who  is  his  own  counsel,  has  a  madman  for  his  client.  But,  mj 
Lord,  I  have  no  money  to  fee  my  brethren.  I  haven't  the 
quidda?n'7w?iorarru7n,  my  Lord  ;  and,  if  I  am  mad,  it  is  poverty, 
and  persecution,  and  the  Jesuits,  that  have  made  me  so.  Ay, 
my  Lord,  the  Jesuits!  For  who  is  counsel  against  me  —  I 
don't  mean  that  Popish  demagogue  Daniel  O'Oonnell,  though 
lie  was  brought  up  at  St.  Omer,  and  bad  enough  he  is  too,  for 
abusing  your  Lordship  about  the  appeals;  but  I  mean  that 
real  son  of  Loyola,  Tom ,  who  was  once  a  practising  par- 
son, and  is  now  nothing  but  a  Jesuit  in  disguise.  But  let  him 
beware  !  Bagenal  Harvey,  who  was  one  of  my  persecutors, 
came  to  an  untimely  end."*  # 

Such  was  the  exordium  of  Counsellor  M'Mahon,f  the  rest  of 
whose  oration  was  in  perfect  conformity  with  the  introductory 
passages  from  which  I  have  given  an  extract.  But,  in  order 
to  form  any  estimate  of  his  eloquence,  you  should  have  seen 
the  prodigy  itself:  the  vehemence  of  his  gesture  corresponded 
with  the  intensity  of  his  emotions.  His  hands  were  violently 
clinched,  and  furiously  dashed  against  his  forehead.  His 
mouth  was  spattered  with  discolored  foam.  His  wig,  of  un- 
powdered  horsehair,  was  flung  off,  and,  in  the  variety  of  frantic 
attitude  which  he  assumed,  his  gown  was  thrown  open,  and  he 
stood  with  scarcely  any  covering  but  his  ragged  shirt,  in  a 
state  of  frightful  emaciation,  before  the  court. 

When  this  ridiculous  but  painful  scene  had  concluded,  "  So 
much,"  I  whispered  to  myself,  "  for  the  dignity  of  the  Irish 
bar!"  I  confess  that  I  divested  myself  of  my  professional 
trappings,  after  having  witnessed  this  exhibition  of  degradation 
and  of  misery,  with  very  different  feelings  from  those  with 

*  Bagenal  Harvey,  of  Bargray  Castle,  was  an  Irish  barrister,  of  good  fortune, 
family  standing,  and  talents.  He  was  a  United  Irishman  in  1798,  and  eventu- 
ally became  Generalissimo  of  the  insurgents,  in  the  outbreak  of  that  year.  He 
fell  into  the  hands  of  Lake,  the  royalist  General,  who  immediately  hanged  him, 
in  company  with  several  others,  and  placed  their  heads  upon  spikes  over  the 
door  of  the  Courthouse  of  Wexford,  where  they  blackened  in  the  sun  for  several 
weeks.  —  M. 

t  This  unfortunate  man,  who  had  distinguished  himself  in  the  University  of 
Dublin,  and  in  early  life  had  married  a  woman  of  large  fortune,  was  latelv  founvj 
«U?ad  in  Sackville  street  [in  1824, — JVI.~J. 


PROFESSIONAL    MISERY.  193 

which  I  had  put  them  on  ;  and,  as  I  walked  from  the  Courts 
with  the  impression  of  mingled  shame  and  commiseration  still 
fresh  upon  me,  I  ventured  to  inquire  of  my  own  consciousness 
whether  there  was  anything  so  cabalistic  in  the  title  of  Coun- 
sellor, which  I  shared  in  common  with  the  wretched  man, 
whom  I  afterward  found  to  be  in  daily  attendance  upon  the 
Hall,  and  whether  I  had  not  a  little  exaggerated  the  impor- 
tance to  which  I  imagined  that  every  barrister  possessed  an 
indisputable  claim.  It  occurred  to  me,  of  course,  that  the  in- 
stance of  calamity  which  I  had  just  witnessed  was  a  peculiar 
one,  and  carried  with  it  more  of  the  outward  and  visible  signs 
of  distress  than  are  ordinarity  revealed.  But  is  agony  the  less 
poignant,  because  its  groans  are  hushed  ?  Is  it  because  sorrow 
is  silent,  that  it  does  not  "consume  the  heart"?  or  did  the 
Spartan  feel  less  pain,  because  the  fangs  that  tore  him  were 
hidden  beneath  his  robe? 

There  is  at  the  Irish  bar  a  much  larger  quantity  of  affliction 
than  is  generally  known.  The  necessity  of  concealing  calam- 
ity is  in  itself  a  great  ill.  The  struggle  between  poverty  and 
gentility,  which  the  ostentatious  publicity  of  the  profession  in 
Ireland  has  produced,  has,  I  believe,  broken  many  hearts.  If 
the  Hall  of  the  Four  Courts  were  the  Palace  of  Truth,  and  all 
its  inmates  carried  a  transparency*  in  their  bosoms,  we  should 
see  a  swarm  of  corroding  passions  at  court  in  the  breasts  of 
many  whose  countenances  are  now  arrayed  in  an  artificial 
hilarity  of  look  ;  and,  even  as  it  is,  how  many  a  glimpse  of 
misery  may  be  caught  by  the  scrutinizing  eye  that  pierces 
through  the  faces  into  the  souls  of  men  !  The  mask  by  which 
it  is  sought  to  conceal  the  real  features  of  the  mind  will  often 
drop  off,  and  intimations  of  affliction  will,  upon  a  sudden,  be 
involuntarily  given.  This  is  the  case  even  with  those  whom 
the  world  is  disposed  to  account  among  the  prosperous;  but 
there  is  a  large  class,  who,  to  an  attentive  and  practised  ob- 
server, appear  habitually  under  the  influence  of  painful  emo- 
tion. The  author  of  "  Vathek"  (a  man  conversant  in  affliction) 
has  represented  the  condemned  pacing  through  the  Hall  of 
Eblis  with  the  same  slow  and  everlasting  footfall  ;  and  I  con- 
fess that  the  blank  and  dejected  air,  the  forlorn  and  hopeless 

Vol.  I.  — 9 


194:  CALAMITIES   OF   THE   BAR. 

eye,  the  measured  and  heart-broken  pace,  of  many  a  man, 
whom  I  have  observed  in  his  revolution  through  the  same  eternal 
round  in  the  Hall  of  the  Four  Courts,  have  sometimes  recalled 
to  me  the  recollection  of  Mr.  Beckford's  melancholy  fancies. 

If  I  were  called  upon  to  assign  the  principal  cause  of  the 
calamities  of  which  so  many  examples  occur  at  the  Irish  bar, 
I  should  be  disposed  to  say  that  their  chief  source  lay  in  the 
unnatural  elevation  to  which  the  members  of  that  body  are 
exalted  by  the  provincial  inferiority  to  which  Ireland  is  re- 
duced. The  absence  from  the  metropolis  of  the  chief  proprie- 
tors, and  indeed  of  almost  all  the  leading  gentry,  has  occa- 
sioned the  substitution  of  a  kind  of  spurious  aristocracy.  An 
Irish  barrister  is  indebted  for  his  importance  to  the  insignifi- 
cance of  his  country ;  but  this  artificial  station  becomes  event- 
ually a  misfortune  to  those  who  are  dependent  upon  their  daily 
exertions  for  their  support ;  and  who,  instead  of  practising  those 
habits  of  provident  frugality  which  are  imposed  by  their  com- 
parative obscurity  upon  the  cloistered  tenants  of  the  two  Tem- 
ples, become  slaves  to  their  transitory  consequence;  and,  after 
having  wasted  the  hard  earnings  of  their  youth  and  manhood 
in  preposterous  efforts  at  display,  leave  their  families  no  better 
inheritance  than  the  ephemeral  sympathy  of  that  public  whose 
worthless  respect  they  had  purchased  at  so  large  a  cost.  Let 
any  man  look  back  to  the  numerous  instances  in  which  appeals 
have  been  made  to  the  general  commiseration  upon  the  decease 
of  some  eminent  member  of  the  bar,  and  he  will  not  be  disponed 
to  controvert  the  justice  of  this  censure  upon  the  ostentatious 
tendencies  of  the  profession. 

Ireland  is,  I  believe,  the  only  country  where  there  exists 
among  the  bar  this  preposterous  tendency  to  ostentatious  ex- 
pense. The  French  bar,  for  example,  live  in  respectable 
privacy,  and  are  wholly  free  from  extravagance.  It  is,  I 
fancy,  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  the  profits  of  the  more  emi- 
nent among  them  are  too  inconsiderable  to  permit  of  the 
silliness  of  display.  The  fees  paid  to  French  counsel  of  rep- 
utation, for  their  opinions,  are  large.  Those  opinions,  indeed, 
are  elaborate  essays  upon  the  law,  and  are  called  "Consul- 
tations."    I  had  occasion,  when  in  Paris,  to  consult  Trippier, 


A    FRENCH    LAWYETJ.  195 

who  is  accounted  the  lest  lawyer  in  Paris.  He  lives  in  the 
Rue  Croix  des  Petis  Champs,  in  apartments  of  a  small  size 
and  indifferently  furnished  ;  and  although  he  has  amassed  a 
large  fortune,  and  has  only  two  daughters,  lives  with  a  pru- 
dence which,  if  an  Irishman  were  to  publish  a  dictionary  of 
synonymes,  would  be  inserted  as  another  name  for  avarice.  I 
was  not  a  little  anxious  to  see  this  celebrated  advocate,  and 
waited  impatiently  in  his  study  for  his  arrival.  A  French 
lawyer  accompanied  me,  who  observed  that  all  his  books 
related  exclusively  to  law.  The  speeches  of  Cochin  and  Patin 
seemed,  indeed,  to  be  the  only  works  connected  with  litera- 
ture in  his  library.  I  was  informed  that  Trippier  valued 
nothing  but  the  profits  of  his  trade,  and  that  he  was  wholly 
innocent  of  the  sin  of  polite  reading.  At  last  the  great  legiste 
appeared.  I  was  instantaneously  struck  with  his  strong  re- 
semblance to  Curran.  He  is  of  precisely  the  same  dimen- 
sions, has  a  countenance  cast  in  the  same  mould,  the  same 
complexion,  the  same  irregularity  of  feature,  and  the  same 
black  and  brilliant  eye.  It  also  surprised  me  to  find  that  there 
was  an  affinity  in  the  sound  of  the  voice,  and  a  similar  ten- 
dency to  place  the  hand  to  the  chin,  and  to  throw  up  the  head 
and  eye  in  the  act  of  speaking.  He  received  us  with  brief 
courtesy,  and  seemed  very  anxious  that  Ave  should  proceed  at 
once  to  the  point.  He  placed  himself  in  a  huge  chair,  and 
assumed  a  most  oracular  aspect.  I  was  a  good  deal  amused 
by  the  transition  of  his  manner,  in  which  there  was  not  a  little 
of  the  conjuror.  He  drew  one  knee  over  the  other,  and  ex- 
tended his  foot,  which  was  covered  with  a  tight  green  slipper. 
He  wrapped  himself  up  in  his  black  silk  robe  dc  riiainbre, 
sustained  his  head  with  his  left  hand,  fixed  his  fore  finger  on 
his  brow,  and,  placing  his  right  hand  to  his  mouth,  protruded 
his  nether  lip  with  an  air  <ff  infallibility.  After  hearing  an 
oral  statement,  to  which  he  gave  an  occasional  nod,  he  put  his 
fee  into  his  pocket,  and  saying  that  the  facts  should  be  set 
forth  upon  paper,  and  that  he  should  then  write  his  opinion, 
bowed  us  out  of  the  room. —  Nota  Bene,  A  French  lawyer 
receives  a  double  fee  on  a  written  statement,  and  fifteen  Napo- 
leons are  not  unusually  paid  to  Trippier. 


196  CALAMITIES    OF   THE   BAR. 

The  life  of  an  eminent  lawyer  may  be  thus  rapidly  sketched  : 
—  He  is  called  without  any  other  property  than  those  talents 
which  have  not  in  general  a  descendible  quality.  For  some 
years  he  remains  unemployed  :  at  last  gets  a  brief,  creeps  into 
the  partialities  of  a  solicitor,  and  sets  up  a  bag  and  a  wife 
together.  Irish  morality  does  not  permit  the  introduction  into 
the  chambers  of  a  barrister  of  those  moveable  objects  of 
unwed  dec!  endearment,  which  Lord  Thurlow  used  to  recom- 
mend to  the  juvenile  members  of  the  profession;  and#  mar- 
riage, that  perpetual  blister,  is  prescribed  as  the  only  effectual 
sanative  for  the  turbulent  passions  of  the  Irish  bar. 

In  the  spirit  of  imprudence,  which  is  often  mistaken  for 
romance,  our  young  counsellor  enters  with  some  dowerless 
beauty  into  an  indissoluble  copartnership  of  the  heart.  A 
pretty  pauper  is  almost  sure  to  be  a  prodigal.  "Live  like 
yourself,"  is  soon  my  lady's  word.  "  Shall  Mrs.  O'Brallaghan, 
the  wife  of  a  mere  attorne3T,  provokingly  display  her  amor- 
phous ankle,  as  she  ascends  the  crimson  steps  of  her  carriage, 
with 'all  the  airs  of  fashionable  impertinence;  and  is  the  Avife 
of  a  counsellor  in  full  practice,  though  she  may  have  'ridden 
double'  at  her  aunt  Deborah's,  to  be  unprovided  with  that 
ordinary  convenience  of  persons  of  condition  V1  After  a  faint 
show  of  resistance,  the  conjugal  injunction  is  obeyed. 

But  is  it  in  an  obscure  street  that  the  coachman  is  to  bring 
his  clattering  horses  to  an  instantaneous  stand  1  Is  he  to 
draw  up  in  an  alley,  and  to  wheel  round  in  a  cut  de  sac?  And 
then  there  is  such  a  bargain  to  be  had  of  a  house  in  Merrion- 
square.  A  house  in  Merrion-square  is  accordingly  purchased, 
and  a  bond,  with  warrant  of  attorney  for  confessing  judgment 
thereon,  is  passed  for  the  fine.  The  lady  discovers  a  taste 
in  furniture,  and  the  profits  of  four  circuits  are  made  oblations 
to  virtu.  The  counsellor  is  raised  to  the  dignity  of  King's 
Consul,  and  his  lady  is  initiated  into  the  splendors  of  the 
Vice-Regal  court.  She  is  now  thrown  into  the  eddies  of  fash- 
ionable life  ;  and  in  order  to  afford  evidence  of  her  domestic 
propensities,  she  issues  cards  to  half  the  town,  with  an  inti- 
mation that  she  is  '  at  home." 

She  has  all  this  while  been  prolific  to  the  full  extent  of  Hi- 


THE   PEATH-BET)   SURVEY.  197 

bernian  fecundity.  The  counsellor's  sons  swagger  it  with  the 
choicest  spirits  of  Kildare  street;  and  the  young  ladies  are 
accomplished  in  all  the  multifarious  departments  of  musical 
and  literary  affectation.  Quadrilles  and  waltzes  shake  the 
illuminated  chambers  with  a  perpetual  concussion.  The  pas- 
senger is  arrested  in  his  nocturnal  progress  by  the  crowd  of 
brilliant  vehicles  before  the  door,  while  the  blaze  of  lio-ht 
streaming  from  the  windows,  and  the  sound  l  f  the  harp  and 
the  taber,  and  the  din  of  extravagance,  intimate  the  joyaunce 
that  is  going  on  within.  But  where  is  the  counsellor  all  this 
while?  He  sits  in  a  sequestered  chamber,  like  a  hermit  in  the 
forest  of  Comus,  and  pursues  his  midnight  labors  by  the  light 
of  a  solitary  taper,  scarcely  hearing  the  din  of  pleasure  that 
rolls  above  his  head. 

The  wasteful  splendor  of  the  drawing-room,  and  the  patient 
drudgery  of  the  library,  go  on  for  years.  The  counsellor  is  at 
the  top  of  the  forensic,  and  his  lady  stands  upon  the  summit, 
of  the  fashionable  world.  At  length  death  knocks  at  the 
door.  He  is  seized  by  a  sudden  illness.  The  loud  knock  of 
the  judges  peals  upon  his  ear,  but  the  double  tap  of  the  attor- 
ney is  heard  no  more.  He  makes  an  unavailing  effort  to 
attend  the  Courts,  but  is  hurried  back  to  his  house,  and  laid  in 
his  bed.  His  eyes  now  begin  to  open  to  the  realities  of  his 
condition.  In  the  loneliness  and  silence  of  the  sick  man's 
chamber  a  train  of  reflections  presents  itself  to  his  mind,  which 
his  former  state  of  professional  occupancy  had  tended  to  ex- 
clude. He  takes  a  death-bed  survey  of  his  circumstances  ; 
looks  upon  the  future  ;  and  by  the  light  of  that  melancholy 
lamp  that  burns  beside  him,  and  throws  its  shadowy  gleams 
upon  his  fortunes,  he  sees  himself,  at  the  close  of  a  most  pros- 
perous life,  without  a  groat.  The  sense  of  his  own  folly,  and 
the  anticipated  destitution  of  his  family,  settle  at  his  heart. 
He  has  not  adopted  even  the  simple  and  cheap  expedient  of 
insuring  his  life,  or  by  some  miserable  negligence  has  let  the 
insurance  drop.  What  is  to  become  of  his  wife  and  his  chil- 
dren 1  From  the  sources  of  his  best  affections,  and  of  his 
purest  pleasures,  he  drinks  that  potion  —  that  aqua  Tophana 
of  the  mind,  which  renders  all   the  expedients  of  art  without 


198  CALAMITIES    OF    THE    BA&. 

avail.     Despair  sits  ministering  beside  him  with  her  poisoned 
chalice,  and  bids   defiance   to   Oolles  and  to  Cheyne.*     His 

*  Colles  and  Cheyne  were  at  the  head  of  the  medical  profession  in  Dublin 
for  many  years.  Abraham  Colles,  born  in  1773,  studied  at  Dublin  University, 
and  was  admitted  a  licentiate  of  the  Royal  College  of  Surgeons  in  1795.  Im- 
mediately after,  he  went  to  Edinburgh,  then  a  great  school  of  medicine,  and 
there  received  the  degree  of  M.  D.  He  thence  went  to  London,  where  he 
pursued  further  anatomical  studies  and  much  assisted  in  making  the  dissec- 
tions from  which  were  made  the  engravings  in  his  friend  Astley  Cooper's  work 
on  Hernia.  Returning  to  Dublin,  he  was  elected  resident  surgeon  of  Steven's 
Hospital,  which  he  continued  from  1799  to  1833,  and  thence,  as  visiting  sur- 
geon, to  1842.  He  became  a  member  of  the  Irish  College  of  Surgeons,  was 
many  years  Censor  and  thrice  President  of  that  body.  He  published  several 
valuable  works  on  Surgery,  and  one  on  the  "  Use  of  Mercury."  He  died  iu 
December,  1843,  aged  71  years.  In  1804  he  was  made  Professor  of  Anatomy 
and  Surgery,  in  the  College  of  Surgeons,  and  continued  in  that  chair  until  1836. 
The  result  of  his  lectures  was  this  —  that  there  were  sixty  medical  and  surgi- 
cal students  per  annum,  when  he  commenced,  and  the  annual  average  latteily 
was  nearly  a  thousand.  Dr.  James  W.  Powell,  now  of  New  York  (the  eminent 
oculist),  who  was  one  of  Colles'  pupils,  informs  me  that  his  lectures  were  "un- 
ambitious in  language,  clear  in  arrangement,  full  of  facts,  sound  in  theory 
plain  in  delivery,  and  crowded  with  practical  illustrations."  In  those  essen 
tials  they  resembled  those  of  Abernethy,  in  London.  Colles  was  an  excellent 
anatomist  —  but  averse  to  show  or  display.  He  was  the  first  surgeon  in  Ireland 
who  ever  tied  the  subclavial  artery :  an  operation  previously  performed  only 
twice  in  England.  And,  in  this  briefest  notice,  should  be  recorded  that  Colles 
was  the  first  surgeon  in  Europe  who  ever  passed  a  ligature  round  the  arteria 
innominata,  the  first  and  largest  branch  derived  from  the  great  trunk  of  the 
aorta.  —  Colles  was  somewhat  of  a  humorist.  In  his  fee-book,  which  he  care- 
fully kept  from  the  commencement  of  his  practice,  he  had  many  curious  entries, 
such  as  "  For  giving  ineffectual  advice  for  deafness  ;  one  guinea;  —  for  attempt- 
ing to  draw  out  the  stump  of  a  tooth,  one  guinea;  —  for  telling  him  that  he 
was  no  more  ill  than  I  was,  one  guinea;  —  for  nothing  that  1  know,  except  that 
lie  probably  thought  he  did  not  pay  me  enough  last  time,  one  guinea."  —  Colles 
was  offered  a  baronetcy,  which  he  declined,  sensibly  saying  that  the  distribu- 
tion he  intended  making  of  his  landed  property  (worth  two  thousand  pounds 
sterling  a  year)  would  not  leave  his  eldest  son  sufficient  to  support  an  heredi- 
tary title. —  Dr.  John  Cheyne,  for  many  years  at  the  head  of  the  physicians 
in  Ireland,  was  a  native  of  Scotland,  and  born  in  1777.  He  served  in  the 
Artillery  as  surgeon,  was  on  duty  in  Ireland,  during  the  revolt  of  1798,  and 
on  his  return  to  Scotland,  became  acquainted  with  Mr.  (afterward  Sir  Charles) 
Be  II,  with  whom  he  studied  pathology  and  anatomy.  At  the  age  of  thirty-five, 
Dr.  Cheyne  setied  in  Dublin.  The  leading  men  in  the  profession,  who  speedily 
saw  that  he  uvderstood  acute  diseases,  as  well  as  being  acquainted  with  mor- 
bid anatomy,    lected  him  Physician  to  Meath  Hospital,  and,  soon  after,  he  was 


fflft   CtOSING    SCENE.  j_9D 

family  gather  about  him.  The  last  consolations  of  religion 
are  given,  amid  heart-broken  sobs  ;  and  as  he  raises  himself, 
and  stretches  forth  his  head  to  receive  the  final  rite,  lie  casts 
his  eyes  upon  the  wretches  who  surround  him,  and  shrinks 
back  at  the  sight. 

It  is  in  the  midst  of  a  scene  like  this,  and  when  the  hour  of 
agony  is  at  hand,  that  the  loud  and  heartless  voice  of  official 
insolence  echoes  from  chamber  to  chamber;  and,  after  a  brief 
interval,  the  dreadful  certainty,  of  which  the  unhappy  man 
had  but  too  prescient  a  surmise,  is  announced.  The  sheriff's 
officers  have  got  in  ;  his  majesty's  writ  of  fieri  facias  is  in  the 
progress  of  execution  ;  the  sanctuaries  of  death  are  violated 
by  the  peremptory  ministers  of  the  law,  and  the  blanket  and 
the  silk  gown  are  seized  together;  and  this  is  the  conclusion 
of  a  life  of  opulence  and  of  distinction,  and,  let  me  add,  of  folly 
as  well  as  fame.  After  having  charmed  his  country  by  his 
eloquence,  and  enlightened  it  by  his  erudition,  he  breathes  his 
last  sigh  amid  the  tears  of  his  children,  the  reproaches  of  his 
creditors,  and  a  bailiff's  jests. 

made  Professor  of  the  practice  of  physic,  to  the  College  of  Surgeons.  This 
being  during  the  Peninsular  war,  when  there  was  a  great  demand  for  army-sur- 
geons, his  lectures  entered  fully  into  military  medicine,  and  were  crowded  du- 
ring five  courses.  He  was  appointed  Physician  to  the  House  of  Industry  in 
1815,  resigning  his  College  Professorship  and,  in  1820,  was  appointed  Phy- 
sician-General to  the  Army,  the  highest  medical  rank  in  Ireland.  His  annual 
income  during  the  next  ten  years  averaged  five  thousand  pounds  sterling,  from 
pi-ivate  practice  alone.  In  1831,  he  was  compelled,  by  the  formation  of  the  cli 
macteric  disease,  which  finally  killed  him,  to  retire  from  practice,  amid  the  regret 
of  all  branches  of  the  profession,  and  took  up  his  abode  at  Sherington,  a  small 
village  in  England,  where  (to  use  his  own  words)  "  thinking  it  better  to  wear 
out  than  to  rust  out,"  he  practised  gi'atuitously  among  the  poor,  wrote  some  ar- 
ticles for  "  The  Cyclopaedia  of  Practical  Medicine,"  and  died  on  the  last  day 
of  January,  1836.  His  family  published  a  posthumus  work,  written  after  In'a 
retirement,  called,  "  Essays  on  Partial  Derangement  of  the  Mind,  in  supposed 
connection  with  Religion,"  in  which  his  theory  is  that  derangement  of  the  mind 
invariably  is  connected  with  bodily  disorder  —  that  religious  madness  in  the  first 
instance,  is  perversion  of  only  one  power  of  the  mind  —  that  clergymen  err  in 
placing  Divine  *ruth  before  those  laboring  under  mental  delusion  until  the  bod- 
ily disease  with  which  it  is  connected  is  cured  or  relieved  —  and  that  many  of 
the  doubts  and  fears  of  some  religious  persons  depend  either  upon  ignorance 
of  ihe  '•onstitutior.  and  operations  of  the  mind,  or  upon  diseases  of  the  body.  —  UL 


200  CALAMITIES    OF    THE    BAft. 

The  calamities  of  which  I  have  drawn  this  sombre  picture, 
are  the  result  of  weakness  and  ostentation.  Their  victims  are, 
upon  that  account,  less  deserving  of  commiseration  than  the 
unhappy  persons  whose  misfortunes  have  not  been  their  fault. 
This  obvious  reflection  recalls  the  image  of  Henry  MacDougall. 
I  hear  his  honest  laugh,  which  it  was  good  for  a  splenetic  heart 
to  hear;  I  see  the  triumph  of  sagacious  humor  in  his  eye ; 
those  feats  of  fine  drollery,  in  which  pleasantry  and  usefulness 
were  so  felicitously  combined,  rise  again  to  my  recollection  ; 
the  roar  of  merriment  into  which  the  bar,  the  jury,  and  the 
bench  used  to  be  thrown  by  this  master  of  forensic  mirth,  re- 
turns upon  my  ear ;  but,  alas !  a  disastrous  token,  with  the 
types  of  death  upon  it,  mingles  itself  with  these  associations. 
Poor  MacDougall !  he  was  prized  by  the  Avise  and  beloved  by 
the  good;  and,  with  a  ready  wit  and  a  cheerful  and  sonorous 
laugh,  he  had  a  manly  and  independent  spirit  and  a  generous 
and  feeling  heart. 

Mr.  MacDougall  was  at  the  head  of  the  Leinster  circuit,  and 
was,  if  not  the  best,  among  the  very  first  class  of  cross-exami- 
ners at  the  Bar.  No  man  better  knew  how  to  assail  an  Irish 
witness.  There  was,  at  first,  nothing  of  the  brow-beating  or 
dictatorial  tone  about  this  good-humored  inquisitor,  who  en- 
tered into  an  easy  familiarity  with  his  victim,  and  addressed 
him  in  that  spirit  of  fantastic  gibe,  which  is  among  the  charac- 
teristics of  the  country.  The  witness  thought  himself  on  a 
level  with  the  counsellor,  who  invited  him  to  a  wrestling- 
match  in  wit,  and,  holding  it  a  great  victory  to  trip  a  lawyer 
up,  promptly  accepted  the  challenge.  A  hard  struggle  used 
often  to  ensue,  and  many  a  time  I  have  seen  the  counsellor  get 
a  severe  fall.  However,  lie  contrived  to  be  always  uppermost 
at  last.  The  whole  of  "  the  fancy,"  who  are  very  numerous  in 
Dublin,  used  to  assemble  to  witness  these  intellectual  gym- 
nastics. A  kind  of  ring  was  formed  round  the  combatants,  and 
my  Lord  Norbury  sat  as  arbiter  of  the  contest,  and  insisted 
upon  fair  play.  The  peals  of  laughter  which  were  produced 
by  his  achievements  in  pleasantry  procured  for  MacDougall 
the  title  of  "  MacDougall  of  the  Roar." 

I  shall  not  readily  forget  his  last  display.     An  action  fat 


MACfrOUGALL   THE   BARRISTER.  201 

slandei  was  brought  by  an  apothecary  against  a  rival  pharma- 
copolist.  One  of  the  apprentices  of  the  plaintiff  was  his  lead- 
ing witness,  and  it  fell  to  Mr.  MacDougall  to  cross-examine 
him.  The  wily  lawyer  induced  the  youthful  Podalirius  to 
make  a  display  of  his  acquirements  in  detailing  the  whole 
process  of  his  art.  The  farce  of  the  "  Mock  Doctor"  has  never 
produced  more  mirth.  All  the  faculty  attended,  and  the  crowd 
of  doctors,  surgeons,  and  man-midwives,  reached  the  roof. 
They  were,  however,  reluctantly  compelled  to  join  in  the 
tumult  of  laughter  created  by  this  formidable  jester  at  their 
expense.  The  chorus  of  apothecaries  in  Moliere's  "  Bourgeois 
Gentilhomme,"  in  which  the  various  mysteries  of  the  profession 
are  detailed,  does  not  disclose  more  matter  for  merriment  than 
was  revealed  in  the  course  of  this  ludicrous  investigation. 

It  is  recorded  of  the  "  satirical  knave,"  that  he  was  assailei 
by  the  illness  of  which  he  died  during  the  personation  of  & 
character  intended  as  a  ridicule  upon  the  faculty.  I  sat  close 
to  Mr.  MacDougall,  and  while  I  participated  in  all  its  mirth, 
my  attention  was  attracted  by  a  handkerchief  which  the 
author  of  all  this  merriment  was  frequently  applying  to  his 
mouth,  and  which  was  clotted  with  blood.  I  thought,  at  first, 
that  it  proceeded  from  some  ordinary  effusion,  and  turned 
again  toward  the  witness,  when  a  loud  laugh  from  the  counsel 
at  the  success  of  a  question  which  he  had  administered  to  the 
young  apothecary,  touching  his  performance  of  Romeo  in  the 
private  theatre  in  Fishamble-street  [Dublin],  directed  my 
notice  a  second  time  to  Mr.  MacDougall,  and  I  perceived  that, 
while  the  whole  auditory  was  shaken  with  mirth,  he  was  taking 
a  favorable  opportunity  of  thrusting  the  bloody  handkerchief 
into  his  bag,  without  attracting  the  general  attention,  and 
immediately  after  applied  another  to  his  lips.  Again  he  set 
upon  the  Romeo  of  Fishamble  street,  and  produced  new  bursts 
of  ridicule,  of  which  he  took  advantage  to  steal  his  bloody 
napkins  away,  and  to  supply  himself,  without  notice,  with  the 
means  of  concealing  the  malady  which  was  hurrying  him  to 
the.  grave. 

A  day  or  two  after  this  trial  his  illness  and  his  ruin  were 
announced.     His  high  reputation  in  his  profession,  his  private 

.     .    ,    U* 


202  CALAMITIES    OF   THE   BAft. 

worth,  liis  large  family,  and  the  opinion  which  had  been  enter- 
tained of  his  great  professional  prosperity,  fixed  the  public 
attention  upon  him.  It  was  at  last  discovered  that  all  the 
earnings  of  a  laborious  life  had  been  laid  out  in  speculations 
upon  lands  belonging  to  the  corporation  of  Waterford,  to  the 
representation  of  which,  it  is  supposed,  he  aspired.  He  had 
borrowed  large  sums  of  money,  and  had  subjected  himself  tc 
enormous  rents.  He  was  induced,  in  the  hope  of  ultimately 
retrieving  his  circumstances,  to  involve  himself  more  deeply  in 
debt;  and  the  rank  of  King's  counsel,  to  which  he  was  raised 
by  Mr.  Plunket,  in  a  manner  equally  honorable  to  both,  offered 
a  new  career  to  his  talents,  and  led  him  to  expect  that  all  his 
difficulties  might  be  at  last  surmounted.  But  the  hope  was  a 
vain  one.  The  pressure  was  too  great  for  him  to  bear,  and  he 
sunk  at  last  beneath  it. 

For  a  long  time  he  struggled  hard  to  conceal  the  state  of  his 
circumstances  and  of  his  mind,  and  assumed  a  forced  hilarity 
of  manners.  He  was  conspicuous  for  an  obstreperous  gayety 
at  the  bar-mess  on  his  circuit,  and  no  man  laughed  so  loudly 
or  so  long  as  he  did ;  but  when  his  apparently  exuberant 
spirits  were  spoken  of,  those  who  knew  him  well  shook  their 
heads,  and  hinted  that  all  was  not  right  within.  And  so  it 
proved  to  be.  His  mind  had  for  years  been  corroded  with 
anxieties.  His  constitution,  although  naturally  vigorous,  was 
slowly  shaken  by  the  sapping  of  continual  care.  A  mortal 
disease  at  length  declared  itself,  in  the  increasing  gush  of  blood 
from  the  gums,  which  he  had  employed  the  expedients  that  I 
have  mentioned  to  conceal.  Yet  even  in  the  hours  of  advan- 
cing dissolution,  he  could  not  be  induced  to  absent  himself 
from  court;  and  the  scene  which  I  have  been  describing  was 
one  of  those  in  which,  if  I  may  so  say,  Momus  and  Death  were 
brought  into  fellowship.  He  died  a  short  time  after  the  trial 
in  which  I  had  noted  this  painful  incident. 

Tc  the  last,  his  love  of  ludicrous  association  did  not  desert 
him.  A  little  while  before  his  departure,  one  of  his  oldest 
friends  was  standing  at  his  bed-side  and  bidding  him  farewell. 
During  this  melancholy  parting,  a  collapse  of  the  jaws  took 
place,  which  rendered   it  necessary  to  tie  a  bandage  under  the 


A   SKKTCH    FROM    LIFE.  203 

chin;  and  in  the  performance  of  the  operation,  with  the  blood 
still  oozing  from  his  month,  and  trickling  down  the  sheets,  he 
turned  his  eyes  languidly  to  his  friends,  and  muttered,  with  a 
faint  smile,  "I  never  thought  to  have  died  chapfallen."  This 
observation  was  not  the  result  of  insensibility  ;  quite  the  re- 
verse. "You  should  have  seen  him  when  he  spoke  it,"  said 
the  gentleman  who  mentioned  the  circumstance;  "  I  felt  like 
the  companion  of  Yorick's  death-bed,  who  perceived,  by  a  jest, 
that  the  heart,  of  his  friend  was  broken."  It  is  consolatory  to 
know,  that  since  his  death  his  property  has  been  turned  to 
good  account,  and  that  his  family  are  placed  in  independence. 

Never  to  attain  to  station  at  the  Bar;  to  carry  the  conscious- 
ness of  high  talent ;  to  think  that  there  is  a  portable  treasure 
in  one's  mind,  which  the  attorneys  do  not  condescend  to  ex- 
plore ;  to  live  for  years  in  hope,  and  to  feel  the  proverbial 
sickness  of  the  heart  arising  from  its  procrastination  —  these 
are  serious  ills.  •  But  the  loss  of  business,  at  an  advanced 
period  of  life,  is  a  far  greater  calamity  than  never  to  have 
attained  its  possession.  Yet  a  distinction  is  to  be  taken. 
Those  who  have  been  deserted  by  their  business  are  divisible 
into  two  classes,  who  are*  essentially  different:  the  prudent, 
who,  with  the  forecast  which  is  so  rare  a  virtue  in  Ireland, 
have  taken  advantage  of  the  shining  of  their  fortunes,  and,  by 
a  sagacious  accumulation,  are  enabled  to  encounter  the  caprices 
of  public  favor;  and  they  who,  after  a  life  of  profuseness,  find 
themselves  at  last  abandoned  by  their  clients,  without  having 
preserved  the  means  of  respectable  support. 

The  former  class  suggest  a  ludicrous,  rather  than  a  melan- 
choly train  of  images.  The  contemplation  of  a  rich  man  out 
of  employment  affords  more  matter  for  merriment  than  for  con- 
dolence. To  this  body  of  opulent  veterans  my  friend  Pomposo 
belongs.  His  success  at  the  Bar  was  eminent.  He  possessed, 
in  a  high  degree,  a  facility  of  fluent  and  sonorous  speech,  and 
had  an  imposing  and  well-rounded  elocution,  a  deep  and  musi 
cal  voice,  a  fine  and  commanding  figure,  and  a  solemn  and 
didactic  countenance.  He  flourished  at  a  period  when  a 
knowledge  of  the  minute  technicalities  of  the  law  was  not 
essential  at  the  Irish  Bar.     There  was  a  time  when  an  Irish 


204  CALAMITIES   OF   THE   BAB. 

counsellor  was  winged  to  heaven  by  a  bill  of  exchange,  and 
drew  tears  from  the  jury  in  an  ejectment  for  non-payment  of 
rent.  In  those  days  Pomposo  was  in  the  highest  repute;  and 
such  was  the  demand  for  him,  that  the  attorneys  upon  opposite 
sides  galloped  from  the  assize  towns  to  meet  him,  and  some- 
times arriving  at  the  same  moment  at  the  open  windows  of  his 
carriage,  thrust  in  their  brief,  and  with  a  shower  of  bank-notes, 
and  simultaneously  exclaimed  that  the  counsellor  belonged  to 
them.  Upon  these  occasions  Pomposo  used  to  throw  himself 
back  in  his  post-chaise  with  an  air  of  imperious  non-chalance, 
and,  pocketing  the  money  of  both  parties,  protest  that  it  was 
among  the  calamities  of  genius  to  be  stopped  in  the  king's 
highway,  and,  drawing  up  the  windows  of  his  carriage,  com- 
manded the  postillion  to  drive  on.  This  half-yearly  triumph 
of  eloquence  through  the  Minister  circuit  lasted  for  a  consider- 
able time,  and  Pomposo  found  himself  a  rich  man.  When, 
after  the  enactment  of  the  Union,  English  habits  began  to 
appear,  and  the  iron  age  of  demurrers  and  of  nonsuits  suc- 
ceeded to  the  glorious  days  of  apostrophes  and  harangues,  it 
was  all  over  with  Pomposo.  Still  he  loved  the  Four  Courts, 
and  haunted  them. 

Becoming  at  last  weary  of  walking  the  Hall,  he  took  refuge 
in  the  Library  attached  to  the  Courts.  It  was  pleasant  to 
hear  him  ask,  with  an  air  of  earnestness,  for  the  oldest  and 
most  unintelligible  repertories  of  black  letter,  in  which  he 
affected  to  seek  a  pastime.  Bracton  seemed  to  be  his  manual, 
and  Fleta  his  vade-mecum.  I  have  heard  his  deep  and  solemn 
voice,  which  still  retained  its  old  rhetorical  tones,  breaking  in 
upon  the  laborious  meditations  of  the  young  gentlemen  who 
had  recently  returned  from  Butler's  or  Sugden's*  offices,  brist- 
ling with  cases  and  with  points,  and  who  just  raised  up  their 
heads  and  invested  their  features  with  a  Lincoln's-Inn  expres- 
sion at  any  intrusion  of  a  lawyer  of  the  old  school  into  this 
repository  of  erudition.  Pomposo,  having  armed  himself  with 
one  of  the  year-books,  took  his  station  tranquilly  by  the  fire, 

*  Charles  Butler  was  a  Catholic,  and  one  of  the  best  special  pleaders  in 
England.  —  Sugden  (now  Lord  St.  Leonards)  wrote  his  great  work  on  Power* 
when  he  was  only  a  year  at  the  bar. —  M. 


YELVERTON    LAWYERS  205 

and  after  stirring  it,  and  commenting  with  his  habitual  mag- 
niloquence upon  the  weather,  threw  open  the  annals  of  justice 
in  the  reign  of  the  Edwards,  and  fell  fast  asleep.  It  has  been 
recorded  of  him  that  he  has  been  heard,  upon  these  occasions, 
to  speak  in  his  slumbers;  and  while  Queen  Mab  was  galloping 
on  his  fingers,  he  has  alternately  intermingled  the  prices  of 
stocks  with  adjuration  to  a  Minister  jury. 

Pomposo  still  goes  the  circuit.  No  man  is  more  punctual  in 
his  attendance  at  the  exact  hour  of  dinner  at  the  Bar-room. 
The  junior,  avIio  is  generally  fresh  from  a  pleader's  office,  and 
enamored  of  Nisi  Prius  upon  his  first  tour,  remains  in  court 
until  the  business  is  concluded,  and  thus  neglects  the  official 
duty  which  requires  his  presence  at  the  Bar-room  at  five 
o'clock.  Pomposo  and  an  old  friend  or  two  enter  together. 
Pomposo  draws  forth  his  watch,  and  exclaims,  "  Ten  minutes 
past  five  o'clock,  and  the  junior  not  yet  come  !"  Having  a 
taste  for  music,  he  beguiles  the  time  with  humming  some  of 
those  airs  for  which  he  was  famous  in  his  youth,  and  goes 
through  the  best  portion  of  the  "  Beggar's  Opera,"  when  six 
o'clock  strikes.  "  I  protest  it  is  six  o'clock,  and  the  junior  is 
not  yet  come — 'When  the  heart  of  a  man,'  &c.;"  and  so 
Pomposo  continues  until  seven  o'clock,  alternately  inveighing 
against  the  remissness  of  modern  juniors,  and,  as  Wordsworth 
has  expressed  it, 

— — — —  "  whistling  many  a  snatch  of  merry  tunes 


That  have  no  mirth  in  them." 

The  wealth  which  this  very  respectable  gentleman  has  ac 
cumulated  raises  him  above  the  sympathy  of  the  Bar.  The 
other  class  of  barristers  without  employment  falls  more  imme- 
diately under  the  title  with  which  I  have  headed  this  article. 
There  was  a  set  of  men  at  the  Irish  Bar  who,  I  think,  may  be 
designated  as  the  "  Yelverton  school  of  lawyers."  Lord  Avon- 
more,  the  Chief  Baron  of  the  Exchequer,  whose  name  wras 
Barry  Yelverton,  originally  belonged  to  that  grade  in  society 
which  is  within  the  reach  of  education,  but  below  that  of  re- 
finement. He  never  lost  the  indigenous  roughness  and  asper- 
ity of  character,  which   it  has  been  said  to  be  the  office   of 


206  CALAMITIES    OF   THE    BAE. 

literature  to  soften  and  subdue;  but  lie  had  a  noble  intellect, 
and  in  the  deep  rush  of  his  eloquence  the  imperfections  of  his 
manner  were  forgotten. 

His  familiarity  with  the  models  of  antiquity  was  great,  and 
his  mind  had  imbibed  much  of  the  spirit  of  the  orators  of 
Greece  and  Rome,  which  he  infused  into  his  own  powerful  dis- 
courses. So  great  was  his  solicitude  to  imbue  himself  with  the 
style  of  the  eminent  writers  whom  he  admired,  that  he  trans- 
lated several  of  their  works,  without  a  view  to  publication. 

His  talents  raised  him  to  the  highest  place  at  the  Bar,  and 
his  political  complaisance  lifted  him  to  the  Bench.  In  private 
life  he  possessed  many  excellent  qualities,  of  which  the  most 
conspicuous  was  his  fidelity  in  friendship.  In  his  ascent  he 
raised  up  the  companions  of  his  youth  along  with  him.  The 
business  of  the  Court  of  Exchequer  was,  under  his  auspices, 
divided  among  a  set  of  choice  spirits  who  had  been  the  boon 
companions  of  his  youth,  and  belonged,  as  well  as  himself,  to 
a  jovial  fraternity,  who  designated  themselves  by  the  very 
characteristic  title  of  "  Monks  of  the  Screw."* 

*  Curran,  who  like  all  wits,  was  an  eminently  social  man,  collected  around 
him,  while  struggling-  at  the  bar,  an  assemblage  of  choice  spirits,  chiefly  of  his 
own  profession.  Among  the  members  were  Henry  Flood,  Grattan,  Father 
O'Leary,  Lord  Charlemont,  Judge  Day  and  others  who  were  destined  to  wear 
the  ermine,  Bowes  Daly,  Jerry  Keller,  Lord  Avonmore,  and  others.  They 
formed  a  jovial  society,  meeting  during  term  on  every  Saturday  night  (the  law- 
yer's holyday),  under  the  presidency  of  Curran,  who  was  Grand  Prior  of  the 
Order,  and  wrote  the  charter  song,  of  which  only  the  following  stanzas  have 
come  down  to  us : — 

"  When  St.  Patrick  our  Order  created, 

And  called  us  the  Monks  of  the  Screw, 
Good  rules  he  revealed  to  our  Abbot, 

To  guide  us  in  what  we  should  do. 
But  first  he  replenished  his  fountain, 

With  liquor  the  best  in  the  sky, 
And  swore,  by  the  word  of  his  saintship, 

That  fountain  should  never  run  dry. 

"  My  children  !  be  chaste  —  till  you're  tempted  : 
While  sol  cr,  be  wise  and  discreet, 
And  humble  your  bodies  with  fasting, 
Whene'cf  —you've  got  nothing  to  cat ' 


MONKS    OF    TTITC    SCREW.  207 

These  merry  gentlemen  en  countered  a  nonsuit  with  a  joke, 
and  baffled  authority  with  a  repartee.  A  system  of  avowed 
and  convivial  favoritism  prevailed  in  the  court;  and  the 
"facundi  calices"  which  had  been  quaffed  with  his  lordship, 
were  not  unnaturally  presumed  to  administer  to  the  inspiration 
of  counsel  on  the  succeeding  day.  The  matins  performed  in 
court  were  but  a  prolongation  of  the  vespers  which  had  been 
celebrated  at  the  abbot's  house;  and  as  long  as  the  head  of 
the  order  continued  on  the  Bench,  the  "Monks  of  the  Screw" 
wrere  in  vogue;  but  when  the  Chief  Baron  died,  their  bags 
were  immediately  assailed  with  atrophy.  They  lost  their  busi- 
ness, and  many  of  them  died  in  extreme  indigence.  It  may 
be  readily  imagined  that  their  habits  were  inconsistent  with 
the  spirit  of  saving.  They  were  first  pitied,  then  forgotten, 
and  soon  after  buried. 

Most  of  these  gentlemen  flourished  and  withered  before  my 
time.  One  of  them,  however,  I  do  remember,  who  survived 
his  companions,  and  whose  natural  vitality  of  spirit,  and  Dio- 
genes turn  of  philosophy,  sustained  his  energy  to  the  last. 
This  was  Mr.  Jeremiah  Keller,  who  was  universally  known 
by  the  more  familiar  appellation  of  Jerry  Keller  in  the  Courts.* 

Then  be  not  a  glass  in  the  convent, 

Except  on  festival  found  ; 
And,  this  rule  to  enforce,  I  ordain  it  — 

A  festival  all  the  year  round." 

Some  five  or  six  years  ago,  I  met  an  aged  clergyman  in  London,  whom  \  rec- 
ollect on  three  accounts:  —  at  the  age  of  86,  he  remembered  all  the  cards 
played  at  whist,  by  whom  played,  and  in  what  order;  he  had  voted  in  1780, 
being  then  twenty-two  years  old,  at  the  election  for  Bristol,  when  one  of  the 
candidates,  following  Burke,  who  had  made  a  long  speech,  briefly  and  effectively 
exclaimed,  "I  say  ditto  to  Mr.  Burke  ;"  and  he  had  been  one  of  the  "Monks  of 
the  Screw."  The  club,  for  it  was  such,  was  established  (he  said)  when  Curran, 
a  poor  man,  could  not  afford  the  expense  of  entertaining  his  boon-companions. 
It  originally  was  a  sort  of  pic  nic,  each  man  sending  in  what  he  pleased,  to  make 
up  the  feast,  the  supply  being  usually  so  abundant  as  to  supply  Curran's 
domestic  wants  for  the  ensuing  week.  Eventually,  the  monks  had  rooms  of 
their  own.  —  M. 

*  Jerry  Keller,  as  he  was  always  called,  was  an  Irish  barrister  of  immense 
talent,  whose  life  was  a  failure.  He  used  no  mean  arts  (and  such  were  com- 
mon in  his  day)  to  obtain  briefs.  He  neither  flattered  seniors  nor  entertained 
attorneys,  nor  flirted  with  their  wives,  nor  coquetted  with  their  daughters.     He 


208  CALAMITIES    OF   THE   BAR. 

The  attorneys  could  deprive  him  of  his  briefs,  but  could  not 
rob  him  of  his  wit.     He  was  a  man 

"  replete  with  mocks, 

Full  of  comparisons  and  wounding  flouts." 

The  loss  of  business  served  to  whet  his  satire  and  give  more 
poignancy  to  his  biting  mirth.  He  used  to  attend  the  Hall 
of  the  Courts  with  punctuality,  and  was  generally  surrounded 
by  a  circle  of  laughers,  whom  the  love  of  malicious  pleasantry 
attracted  about  him.  His  figure  and  demeanor  were  remark- 
able. He  never  put  on  his  wig  and  gown,  as  he  scorned  the 
affectation  of  employment,  but  appeared  in  an  old  frieze  great- 
coat of  rusty  red,  which  reached  to  his  heels,  and  enveloped 
the  whole  of  his  gaunt  and  meagre  person.  A  small  and 
pointed  hat  stood  upon  his  head,  with  a  narrow  and  short- 
curled  brim.  His  arms  were  generally  thrust  into  the  sleeves 
of  his  coat,  which  gave  him  a  peculiarity  of  attitude. 

Looking  at  him  from  a  distance,  you  would  have  taken  him 
for  some  malevolent  litigant  from  the  country,  upon  whose 
passions  a  group  of  mockers  were  endeavoring  to  play  ;  but, 
upon  a  more  attentive  perusal  of  his  countenance,  you  per- 
ceived a  habit  of  thought,  of  a  superior  order,  and  the  expres- 

did  not  succeed  at  the  bar,  as  a  man  so  gifted  should  have  succeeded.  At  last 
he  limited  his  ambition  to  shining  at  the  social  board,  and  there  few  eclipsed 
him.  A  dull  rival,  named  Mayne,  was  made  a  judge  ;  "  There,"  he  was  heard 
to  mutter,  like  the  under-growl  of  a  tempest,  "  Mayne  sits,  risen  by  his  grav- 
ity, and  Keller  sunk  by  his  levity:  wbat  would  Newton  say  to  that .'"  —  He  was 
witty.  He  dined,  in  1780,  at  the  house  of  one  Garrett  Moore,  grocer  and  whis- 
key-vender, in  Aungier  street,  Dublin.  When  the  mirth  grew  "  fast  and  furi- 
ous," an  intimation  was  made  that  the  lady  of  the  house  had  just  been  confinea. 
"Let  us  adjourn,"  said  his  friend.  "  Certainly,"  replied  Jerry,  " pro  re  nata." 
The  young  stranger,  was  Thomas  Moore,  the  poet. — An  attorney,  with  a  pecu- 
liar malformation  of  hands,  explaining  an  act  of  parliament,  sprawled  his  de- 
formed members  over  the  page.  "  Here  it  is,"  he  cried,  "  here's  the  clause." 
Jerry  answered,  "  you  are  right,  for  once  —  they're  more  like  claws  than  hands." 
When,  in  1800,  Barry  Yelverton  was  raised  from  the  rank  of  Baron,  to  that  of 
Visccunt  Avonmore,  because  he  had  voted  for  the  Union,  he  summoned  a  few 
friends  to  read  the  draft  of  the  patent.  It  was  worded,  "To  all  to  wbom 
these  letters^)  itent  sball  come,  greeting ;  We  of  the  United  kingdom  of  Great 
Britain  and  Ireland  — "  —  "Stop!"  said  Keller,  who  was  one  of  the  party 
"  the  consideration  is  set  out  too  early  in  the  deed," — M, 


jerry  Keller's  biting  wit.  209 

sion  of  no  ordinary  mind.  His  features  were  sharp,  and 
pointed  to  the  finest  edge.  There  was  that  acuteness  of  the 
nose  which  denotes  the  lover  of  a  gibe.  His  eyes  were  pier- 
cing, clear,  and  brassy;  they  were  filled  with  a  deadly  irony, 
which  never  left  them.  A  flash  of  malignant  exultation  play- 
ed over  his  features  when  he  saw  how  deeply  the  shaft  had 
struck,  and  with  what  a  tenacity  it  stuck  to  his  victim.  The 
quiver  of  his  lip,  in  giving  utterance  to  some  mortal  sneer,  was 
peculiarly  comical :  he  seemed  as  if  he  were  chewing  the 
poison  before  he  spat  it  forth.  His  teeth  gave  a  short  chatter 
of  ridicule  ;  you  heard  a  dry  laugh,  a  cachinnus  which  wrinkled 
all  his  features,  and  after  a  sardonic  chuckle,  he  darted  forth 
the  fatal  jest,  amidst  those  plaudits  for  its  bitterness  which  had 
become  his  only  consolation. 

Jerry  Keller,  as  the  senior,  presided  at  the  mess  of  the  Mun- 
ster  bar,  and  ruled  in  all  the  autocracy  of  unrivalled  wit.  It 
was  agreed  upon  all  hands  that  Jerry  should  have  a  carte- 
blanche  with  every  man's  character,  and  that  none  of  his  sar- 
casms, however  formidable,  should  provoke  resentment.  This 
was  a  necessary  stipulation  ;  for  when  he  had  been  roused  by 
those  potations,  in  which,  according  to  a  custom  which  he  did 
not  consider  as  "  honored  by  the  breach,"  he  liberally  in- 
dulged, there  was  a  Malagrowther  savageness  in  his  sarcasm 
which  made  even  the  most  callous  shrink.  He  avIio  laughed 
loudest  at  the  thrust  which  his  neighbor  had  received,  was  the 
next  to  feel  the  weapons  of  this  immitigable  satirist.  To  enter 
into  a  struggle  with  him,  was  a  tempting  of  God's  providence. 
You  were  sure  to  be  pierced  in  an  instant  by  this  accomplished 
gladiator,  who  could  never  be  taken  off  his  guard.  Jerry  had 
been  a  Catholic,  and  still  retained  a  lurking  reverence  for  a 
herring  upon  Good  Friday.  A  gentleman  of  no  ordinary  pre- 
tension,* observing  that  Jerry  abstained  from  meat  on  that 
sacred  day,  ventured  to  observe,  "  I  think,  Jerry,  you  have 
still  a  damned  deal  of  the  Pope  in  your  belly."  —  "  If  I  have," 
said  Jerry,  "you  have  a  damned  deal  of  the  Pretender  in  your 
head." 

Nicholas  Purcell  O'Gorman,  Secretary  to  the  Catholics  for  many  years,  and 
appointed  County  Judge  by  Lord  Anglesey,  when  Vicerov, —  ]Vl- 


210  CALAMITIES    OF    THE    BAR. 

I  was  one  clay  (let  not  the  reader  allow  himself  to  be  startled 
by  too  sudden  a  transition  from  Dublin  to  Constantinople) — I 
was,  I  recollect,  one  day,  repeating  this  sarcasm  to  a  gentle- 
man who  had  recently  returned  from  the  East,  and  mentioned 

the  name  of  the  barrister,  Mr.  N ,   to   whom  it  had  been 

applied ;  and  I  was  a  good  deal  surprised,  that,  instead  of 
joining  in  a  laugh  at  the  bitterness  of  the  retort,  his  face  as- 
sumed a  melancholy  expression.  I  asked  him  the  cause  of  it, 
when  he  told  me,  that  the  name  which  I  had  just  uttered,  had 
recalled  to  him  a  very  remarkable  and  very  painful  incident 
which  had  happened  to  him  at  Constantinople.  I  begged  him 
to  relate  it.  "I  was  one  evening,"  he  said,  "  walking  in  the 
cemeteries  of  Constantinople.  But  I  have,  I  believe,  written 
an  account  of  this  adventure  in  my  journal,  and  had  better 
read  it  to  you." 

He  accordingly  took  a  huge  book  from  a  drawer,  and  read 
as  follows:  —  "It  is  not  unusual  for  the  inhabitants  of  the 
Asiatic  portion  of  the  great  capital  of  Islamism,  to  walk  in  the 
evening  amid  the  vast  repositories  of  the  dead,  which  are 
adjacent  to  Scutari.  Death  is  little  dreaded  in  the  East,  while 
the  remains  of  the  deceased  are  objects  of  tenderness  and 
respect  among  their  surviving  kindred.  This  pious  sentiment 
being  unaccompanied  by  that  dismay  with  which  we  are  apt  to 
look  upon  the  grave,  attracts  the  Turks  to  the  vast  fields  where 
their  friends  and  kindred  are  deposited. 

"  I  proceeded  upon  a  summer  evening  from  Constantinople, 
properly  so  called,  to  the  Asiatic  side,  and  entered  the  vast 
groves  of  cypresses  which  mark  the  residence  of  the  dead.  The 
evening  was  brilliant.  There  was  not  a  breath  of  wind  to 
stir  the  leaves  of  those  dismal  trees,  which  spread  on  every 
side  as  far  as  the  sight  can  reach,  and,  being  planted  in  long 
and  uniform  lines,  open  vistas  of  death,  and  conduct  the  eye 
through  long  sweeps  of  sepulchres  to  the  horizon.  The  dwel- 
lings of  the  dead  were  filled  with  the  living.  The  ranges  of 
cypresses  were  crowded  with  Turks,  who  moved  with  that  slow 
and  solemn  gait  which  is  peculiar  to  the  country.  The  flowing 
and  splendid  dresses  of  those  majestic  infidels,  their  lofty  tur- 
bans, of  which  the  image  is  sculptured  upon  every  monument. 


A   TURKISH    CEMETERY.  211 

their  noble  demeanor,  and  their  silence  and  collectedness,  by 
the  union  of  life  and  death  together,  gave  an  additional  solem- 
nity to  this  imposing  spectacle.  The  setting  of  the  sun  threw 
a  mournful  splendor  upon  the  foliage  of  the  trees,  and  lighted 
up  this  forest  of  death  with  a  funereal  glory. 

"  I  leaned  against  a  cypress  which  grew  over  a  grave  en 
which  roses  had  been  planted.  From  this  spot,  full  of  those 
'  flower-beds  of  graves,'  as  Mr.  Hope*  has  called  them,  and 
which  mothers  or  sisters  had  in  all  likelihood  so  adorned  (it 
is  the  usage  in  the  East  to  apparel  a  tomb  with  these  domestic 
tokens  of  endearment),  I  looked  around  me.  While  I  was 
contemplating  'this  patrimony  of  the  heirs  to  decay,'  my 
attention  was  attracted  by  a  man  dressed  in  tattered  white,  and 
with  a  ragged  turban  on  his  head,  who  stood  at  a  small  dis- 
tance from  me,  and,  although  attired  in  the  dress  of  the  coun- 
try, had  something  of  the  Frank  in  his  aspect.  There  was 
an  air  of  extreme  loneliness  and  desolation  about  him.  He 
leaned  with  his  back  to  a  marble  sepulchre,  which  was  raised 
by  the  side  of  the  public  road  that  for  miles  traverses  the 
cemeteries.  His  arms  were  folded,  his  head  was  sunk  on  his 
chest,  and  his  eyes  fixed  upon  the  earth.  The  evening  was 
far  advanced,  and,  as  it  grew  dark,  the  crowds  who  had  pre- 
viously filled  the  cemeteries  began  to  disperse. 

"As  the  brightness  of  the  evening  passed  away,  I  perceived 
that  dense  and  motionless  cloud  of  stagnant  vapors,  which  had 
disappeared  in  the  setting  sun,  but  which,  Mr.  Hope  tells  us, 
for  ever  hangs  over  these  dreary  realms,  and  is  exhaled  from 
the  swelling  soil  ready  to  burst  with  its  festering  contents.  A 
chilly  sensation  stole  upon  me,  and  I  felt  that  I  was  '  set  down 
in  the  midst  of  the  valley  which  was  full  of  bones.'  I  was 
about  to  depart  from  this  dismal  spot,  when,  looking  toward  the 
sepulchre  where  I  had  observed  the  solitary  figure  I  have  been 
describing,  I  perceived  that  he  was  approaching.  I  was  at 
first  a  little  startled,  and,  although  my  apprehensions  passed 
away  when  he  addressed  me  in  the  English  language,  my 
surprise,  when  I  looked  at  him,  was  not  a  little  increased.  He 
Baid,  that  lie  conjectured  from  my  appearance  that  I  was  an 
*  Jji  "  Anastatius,'   a  Turkish  romance,  by  the  late  Thomas  Hope. —  M. 


212  CALAMITIES    OF   THE   BAR. 

Englishman  ;  and  was  proceeding  to  implore,  with  the  faltering 
of  shame,  for  the  means  of  sustenance,  when  I  could  not  avoid 
exclaiming,  'Gracious  God!  can  it  be?'  —  'Alas!'  said  the 
unfortunate  man,  covering  his  face  with  his  hands,  '  it  is  too 
true.     I  am  Mr.  N ,  of  the  Irish  bar.'"* 

The  gentleman  who  read  this  singular  incident  from  his 
journal,  was  at  the  time  employed  in  writing  a  Tour  in  the 
East,  and  may  have  tinged  his  description  of  the  cemeteries 
of  Stamboul  with  some  mental  colors.  But,  of  the  fact  of  this 
interview  having  taken  place  in  the  burial-ground  of  Constan- 
tinople, I  have  no  doubt.  It  would  not  be  easy  to  imagine 
adventures    more   disastrous  than  those   of  the  unhappy  Mr. 

N .     He  moved  in  Dublin  in  the  highest  circles,  and  was 

prized  for  the  gracefulness  of  his  manners  and  the  gayety  of 
his  conversation.  He  became  a  favorite  at  the  castle,  and  was 
admitted  to  the  private  parties  at  the  vice-regal  palace.  The 
late  Duchess  of  Gordon  visited  Ireland,  and  was  greatty 
pleased  with  his  genius  for  losing  at  piquet.  No  person  was 
preferred  by  that  ingenious  dowager  to  a  votary  of  fortune, 
who  still  continued  to  worship  at  a  shrine  where  his  prayers 
had  never  been  heard.  It  was  rumored  that  he  was  every 
day  plunging  himself  more  deeply  into  ruin  ;  still  he  preserved 
his  full  and  ruddy  cheek,  and  his  glittering  and  cheerful  eye. 
Upon  a  sudden,  however,  the  crash  came,  and  his  embarrass- 
ments compelled  him  to  leave  the  country. 

He  had  one  friend,  Mr.  Croker,  of  the  Admiralty,  had  known 
him  when  he  was  himself  at  the  Irish  bar,  and  was  diligently 
employed  in  writing  those  admirable  satires,  with  which  I 
shall  endeavor,  upon  some  future  occasion,  to  make  the  En- 
glish public  better  acquainted  ;  for  Mr.  Croker  is  not  only  the 
author  of  "  The  Battle  of  Talavera,"  but  likewise  of  the 
"Familiar    Epistles,"   and    is  thought   to  have    assisted    Mr. 

*  Mr.  Norcott  was  the  person  here  indicated.  He  was  a  great  favorite  with 
the  Duke  of  Richmond  (who  was  Viceroy  of  Ireland  from  1807  until  1813),  and 
sacrificed  his  har  prospects,  which  were  good,  and  his  talents,  which  were  con- 
siderable, to  the  poor  vanity  of  being  a  court-favorite.  His  fortune  passed 
from  him  at  the  card-table  —  as  it  often  does  when  the  points  at  6hort  whig*"  are 
fifty  guineas  each,  with  "  a  pony"  (or  five-and-twenty  pounds)  on  the  odd  trick. 
He  perished,  a  renegade,  as  described  in  the  sketch,  —  M. 


JOHN    WILSON    CHOKER.  218 

N in  the    composition    of  "  The    Metropolis."*      These 

very  able  pasquinades  were  hut  the  preludes  to  high  under- 
takings. 

*  John  Wilson  Croker,  well  known  as  a  politician  and  author,  was  born  in 
1780,  educated  at  Dublin  University,  and  called  to  the  bar  in  1802.     Accident 
threw  him  into  Parliament  —  for,  having  been  professionally  engaged  at  Down- 
patrick  election,  in  1807,  he.  was  i*eturned  as  member  for  that  borough.     Thence, 
until  the  passing  of  the  Reform  Bill,  in   1832,  he  continuously  held  a  seat  in 
Parliament  —  five  years  of  that  period,  for  the  University  of  Dublin.     In  1809, 
when  Colonel  Wardle  brought  his  charges  against  the  Duke  of  York  (second 
son  of  George  III.,  and  Commander-in-Chief  of  the  army),  of  having  permitted 
Mary  Ann  Clarke,  his  mistress,  to  dispose  of  military  and  Other  appointments, 
under  his  patronage,  Croker  so  ably  and  zealously  defended  the  Duke,  as  a  vol- 
unteer, that  (though  his  convicted  client  had  to  resign  the  command  of  the 
army)  the  post  of  Secretaiy  of  the  Admiralty  was  given  him,  in  gratitude  for 
the  service,  and  he  retained  this  lucrative  office,  then  worth  nearly  three  thou- 
sand pounds  sterling  a  year,  until  1830,  when  he  retired,  on  the  break-up  of  the 
Wellington   Ministry,  on   a  pension  of  fifteen   hundred  pounds  a  year.     Two 
years  earlier  he  had  been  made  a  Privy  Councillor.     When  the  Grey  Adminis- 
tration brought  in  and  carried  their  Reform  Bill,  they  were  met  on  every  detail 
by  Croker,  who  showed  a  tact,  readiness,  and   even   eloquence,  joined  with 
ready  wit  and  sarcasm,  for  which  few  had  previously  given  him  credit.     To  use 
the  language  in  which  Mr.  Thackeray  described  the  glorious  conduct  of  the 
great  Washington,  he  "fought  with  a  courage  worthy  of  a  better  cause  !"  — 
Here  ended  Croker' s  political  life,  for  he  kept  his  vow  that  he  would  not  sit  in 
a  reformed  House  of  Commons.     His  earlier  literary  productions,  sarcastic  and 
Bhrewd,  were  on  local  subjects,  and  had  their  chief  celebrity  in  Dublin,  where 
their  allusions  were  understood  and  relished.     His  first  prose  work  of  perma- 
nent interest  was  called  "  Stories  from  the  History  of  England,"  which  Scott 
took  as  the  model  of  his  own  familiar  "  Tales  of  a  Grandfather."     He  has 
edited  the  Suffolk  Papers,  the  Letters  of  Lady  Hervey  and  her  husband,  and 
Boswell's  Life  of  Johnson.     This  last,  which  was  crowded  with  errors  amid  a 
great  mass  of  new  and  illustrative  annotation,  drew  down  a  severe  critique,  in 
the  "  Edinburgh  Review"  from  the  pen  of  Macaulay  ;  a  favor  which  Croker  re- 
turned, with  interest,  on    Macaulay's   "  History  of  England."     This   critique 
appeared  in  the  "Quarterly  Review"  established,  in  1809,  through  the  combi- 
nation of  Scott,  Canning,  Croker,  and  their  friends.     Croker,  who  was  admit- 
ted to  much  familiarity  with   George  IV.,  both   as   Regent   and   King,  was  in 
habits  of  intimacy  with  the  nobility  as  well  as  the  leading  men  of  letters  and 
artists  on  the  Tory  side.     One  of  his  latest  criticisms  was  published  in  the  Quar- 
terly Review  for  July,  1853,  on  Lord  John  Russell  s  "  Life,  Journals,  and  Let- 
ters, of  Thomas  Moore,"  in  which  the  noble  edito-  and  the  peer-loving  "  poet 
of  all  circles"  were  ruthlessly  tormented,  tomahaw  Red,  and  scalped.     It  is  an 
old  and  true  saying  that  "  those  who  play  at  bowls  must  expect  rubbers,"  and 
Mr.  Croker  has  been  treated,  in  this  retributive  spirit,  by  Mr.  D'Israeli,  who 


21 4:  CAL AMITIES    OF   THE    BAft. 

It  does  Mr.  Croker  great  honor  tha*,  in  Lis  emergencies,  Ins 
brother  barrister  and  satirist  was  not  forgotten.  The  honor- 
able Secretary  promised  a  lucrative  situation  for  Mr.  N in 

the  island  of  Malta.  His  Irish  friends  looked  forward  to  the 
period  when  he  should  be  enabled,  after  recruiting  his  cir- 
cumstances, to  return  to  Ireland,  and  to  reanimate  Kildare- 
street  club-house,  with  that  vivacious  pleasantry  of  which  he 
was  a  felicitous  master  ;  when,  to  everybody's  astonishment, 
it  was  announced  that  Mr.  N.  had  left  the  island,*  had  taken 
up  his  residence  at  Constantinople,  and  renounced  his  religion 
with  his  hat. 

He  became  a  renegade,  and  invested  his  brows  with  a  tur- 
ban. The  motives  assigned  for  this  proceeding  it  is  not  neces- 
sary to  mention.  It  is  probable  that  he  involved  himself  a 
second  time  by  play,  and  that  he  had  no  other  resource  than 
the  expedient  of  a  conversion,  through  the  painful  process  of 
which  he  heroically  went-  Having  carried  some  money  with 
him  to  Constantinople,  he  at  first  made  a  considerable  figure. 
He  was  dressed  in  the  extreme  of  Turkish  fashion,  and  was 
considered  to  have  ingratiated  himself  by  his  talents  into  the 
favor  of  some  leading  members  of  the  Divan.  His  prosperity 
at  Constantinople,  however,  was  evanescent.  His  money  was 
soon  spent,  and  he  fell  into  distress.  Letters  of  the  most 
heart  rending  kind  were  written  to  his  friends  in  Dublin,  in 
which  he  represented  himself  as  in  want  of  the  common  means 
of  subsistence. 

It  was  in  this  direful  state  of  destitution  that  he  addressed 
himself,  in  the  cemeteries  of  Constantinople,  to  a  person  whom 
he  guessed  to  be  a  native  of  these  countries,  and  whom  he  dis- 
covered to  be  hfs  fellow-citizen.     His  condition  was  lamentable 

has  drawn  him,  in  his  political  novel  of  "  Conyngsby,"  as  the  mean,  toadying-,  and 
illiberal  Digby.  It  is  understood  that,  though  now  [1854]  in  his  seventy-fourth 
year,  Mr.  Croker  is  editing  the  works  of  Alexander  Pope.  In  his  editorial  as 
well  as  in  his  critical  capacity,  Croker  avoids  anything  like  a  broad  view  of  the 
subject,  but  carefully  creeps  over  it,  applying  himself  to  the  examinat:on  of 
minute  details.  He  is  never  so  happy  as  when  he  "  breaks  a  butterfly  up  jn  the 
wheel."  — M. 

*  Barrington  says,  "  At  Malta  he  soon  disgraced  himself  in  a  manner  which 
for  ever  excluded  him  from  society. —  M." 


the  renegade's  fate.  215 

beyond  the  power  of  description.  His  dress  was  at  once  the 
emblem  of  apostacy  and  of  want.  It  hang  in  rags  about  a 
person  which,  from  a  robust  magnitude  of  frame,  had  shrunk 
into  miserable  diminution.  He  carried  starvation  in  his 
cheeks;  ghastliness  and  misery  overspread  his  features,  and 
despair  stared  in  his  glazed  and  sunken  eye.  He  did  not  long 
survive  his  calamities. 

The  conclusion  of  his  story  may  be  briefly  told.  For  a 
little  while  he  continued  to  walk  through  the  streets  of  Con- 
stantinople in  search  of  nourishment,  and  haunted  its  ceme- 
teries like  the  dogs  to  which  Christians  are  compared.  He 
had  neither  food,  roof,  nor  raiment.  At  length  he  took  the 
desperate  resolution  of  relapsing  into  Christianity;  for  he 
indulged  in  the  hope,  that,  if  he  could  return  to  his  former 
faith,  and  effect  his  escape  from  Constantinople,  although  he 
could  not  appear  in  these  countries  again,  yet,  on  the  conti- 
nent, he  might  obtain  at  least  the  means  of  life  from  the 
friends,  who,  although  they  could  not  forgive  his  errors,  might 
take  compassion  upon  his  distress.  He  accordingly  endeav- 
ored to  fly  from  Constantinople,  and  induced  some  Englishmen 
who  happened  to  be  there,  to  furnish  money  enough  to  effect 
his  escape.  But  the  plot  was  discovered.  He  was  pursued, 
and  taken  at  a  small  distance  from  Constantinople;  his  head 
Avas  struck  off  upon  the  beach  of  the  Bosphorus,  and  his  body 
thrown  into  the  sea. 


THOMAS   LEFROY. 

There  is  something  apparently  irreconcilable  between  the 
ambition  and  avidity  which  are  almost  inseparable  from  the 
propensities  of  a  successful  lawyer,  and  any  very  genuine  en- 
thusiasm in  religion.  The  intense  worldliness  of  his  profession 
must  produce  upon  his  character  and  faculties  equally  tangi- 
ble results,;  and  if  it  has  the  effect  of  communicating  a  minute 
astuteness  to  the  one,  it  is  not  very  likely  to  impart  a  spirit  of 
lofty  abstraction  to  the  other.  I  can  not  readily  conceive  any- 
thing more  sublunary  than  the  bar.  Its  occupations  allow  no 
respite  to  the  mind,  and  refuse  it  all  leave  to  indulge  in  the 
aspirations  which  a  high  tendency  to  religion  not  only  gener- 
erates,  but  requires.  They  will  not  even  permit  any  native 
disposition  to  enthusiasm  to  branch  aloft,  but  fetter  it  to  the 
earth,  and  constrain  it  to  grow  down.  How  can  the  mind  of  a 
lawyer,  eddying  as  it  is  with  such  fluctuating  interests,  receive 
upon  its  shifting  and  troubled  surface  those  noble  images  which 
can  never  be  reflected  except  in  the  sequestered  calm  of  deep 
and  unruffled  thought?  He  whose  spirit  carries  on  a  continued 
commerce  with  the  skies,  is  not  only  ill  adapted  to  the  ordinary 
business  of  society,  but  is  scarcely  conscious  of  it.  He  can 
with  difficulty  perceive  what  is  going  on  at  such  a  distance 
below  him;  and  if  he  should  ever  divert  his  eyes  from  the 
contemplation  of  the  bright  and  eternal  objects  upon  which 
they  are  habitually  fixed,  it  is  but  to  compassionate  those  whom 
he  beholds  engaged  in  the  pursuit  of  the  idle  and  fantastic 
fires  that  mislead  us  in  our  passage  through  "this  valley  of 
tears." 

To  such  a  man,  the  ordinary  ends  of  human  desire  must  ap- 


SIS   SAINTLY   CflARACTEtt.  217 

pear  to  be  utterly  preposterous  and  inane.  The  reputation  which 
Romilly  has  left  behind  must  sound  as  idle  in  his  ears  as  the 
wind  that  shakes  the  thistle  upon  his  grave.  An  ardent  reli- 
gionist must  shrink  from  those  offices  which  a  lawyer  would 
designate  as  the  duties,  and  which  are  among  the  necessary 
incidents,  of  his  profession.  To  play  for  a  little  of  that  worth- 
less dross,  which  is  but  a  modification  of  the  same  material 
upon  which  he  must  at  last  lie  low,  all  the  multiform  variety 
of  personation  which  it  is  the  business  of  a  lawyer  to  assume  — 
to  barter  his  anger  and  his  tears  —  to  put  in  mirth  or  sorrow, 
as  it  suits  the  purpose  of  every  man  who  can  purchase  the 
mercenary  joke  or  the  stipendiary  lamentation  —  these  appear 
to  be  offices  for  which  an  enthusiastic  Christian  is  not  eminently 
qualified.  Still  less  would  he  be  disposed  to  misquote  and  to 
misrecite  —  to  warp  the  facts,  and  to  throw  dust  into  the  eyes 
of  justice  —  to  enter  into  an  artificial  sympathy  with  baseness 
—  to  make  prostitutes  of  his  faculties,  and  surrender  them  in 
such  an  uncompromising  subserviency  to  the  passions  of  his 
client,  as  to  make  them  the  indiscriminate  utensils  of  de- 
pravity. 

How  fallacious  is  all  speculation  when  unillustrated  by  ex- 
ample, and  how  rapidly  these  misty  conjectures  disappear, 
before  the  warm  and  conspicuous  piety  of  the  learned  gentle- 
man whose  name  is  prefixed  to  this  number  of  the  "  Sketches 
of  the  Irish  Bar."  This  eminent  practitioner,  who  has  rivals 
in  capacity,  but  is  without  a  competitor  in  religion,  refutes  all 
this  injurious  surmise ;  and  in  answer  to  mere  inference  and 
theory,  the  sainted  fraternity  among  whom  he  plays  so  remark- 
able a  part,  and  who  with  emulative  admiration  behold  him 
uniting  in  his  person  the  good  things  of  the  Old  Testament, 
with  the  less  earthly  benedictions  of  the  New,  may  triumph- 
antly appeal  to  the  virtues  and  to  the  opulence  of  Mr.  Sergeant 
Lefroy. 

The  person  who  has  accomplished  this  exemplary  reconcili- 
ation between  characters  so  opposite  in  appearance  as  a  de- 
voted follower  of  the  gospel  and  a  wily  disputant  at  the  bar, 
stands  in  great  prominence  in  the  Four  Courts,  but  is  still 
more  noted  among  "the  saints"  in  Dublin,  and  I  think  may  be 

Vol.  I.  — 10 


SI  8  THOMAS    LEFEOY. 

accounted  their  leader.  These  are  an  influential  and  rapidly- 
increasing  body,  which  is  not  wholly  separated  from  the  church, 
but  is  appended  to  it  by  a  very  loose  and  slender  tie.  They 
maybe  designated  as  the  Jansenists  of  the  establishment;  for 
in  their  doctrines  of  grace  and  of  election  they  border  very 
closely  upon  the  professors  of  the  Port-Royal.  For  men  who 
hold  in  such  indifference  the  pleasures  of  the  world,  they  are 
singularly  surrounded  with  its  fugacious  enjoyments.  Encom 
passed  with  innocuous  luxuries  and  innocent  voluptuousness 
they  felicitously  contrast  their  external  wealth  with  that  mor- 
tification of  the  spirit  of  which  they  make  so  lavish  a  profes- 
sion, and  of  which  none  but  an  irreclaimable  skeptic  could 
entertain  a  doubt. 

At  the  bar  they  are  to  be  found  in  considerable  strength, 
and  are  distinguished  among  their  brethren  for  their  zeal  in 
the  advancement  of  the  interests  of  religion  and  their  own. 
They  are,  in  general,  sedulous  and  well-informed  —  competent 
to  the  discharge  of  ordinary  business,  and  free  of  all  ambition 
of  display  —  a  little  uncandid  in  their  practice,  and  careless  of 
the  means  by  which  success  is  to  be  attained — pursuivants  of 
authority  and  followers  of  the  great  —  gentlemanlike  in  their 
demeanor,  but  not  without  that  touch  of  arrogance  toward  their 
inferiors  which  is  an  almost  uniform  attendant  upon  an  over- 
anxious deference  to  power  —  strong  adherents  to  abstract 
principles  of  propriety,  and  vehement  inculcators  of  the  eternal 
rules  of  right,  but  at  the  same  time  not  prodigally  prone  to  any 
Samaritan  sensibilities  —  amiable  in  their  homes,  and  some- 
what selfish  out  of  them  —  fluent  reciters  of  the  Scriptures  — 
conspicuously  decent  in  their  manners,  and  entirely  regardless 
if  the  apple-wenches  in  the  Hall. 

The  great  prototype  of  this  meritorious  fraternity  is  Mr.  Ser- 
geant Lefroy.  It  would  do  good  to  the  heart  of  the  learned 
member  for  Gal  way  to  visit  his  stables  on  a  Sunday.  The 
generous  animals  who  inhabit  these  exemplary  tenements,  par- 
ticipate in  his  relaxations,  and  fulfil  with  scriptural  exactness 
the  sacred  injunction  of  repose.  Smooth  as  their  benevolent 
master,  they  stand  in  their  stalls  amid  all  the  luxury  of  grain, 
and,  from  their  sobriety  and  sleekness,  might  readily  be  recog- 


A    GOfr-FEARiNG    LAWYER.  2l9 

nised  as  the  steeds  of  a  prosperous  and  pious  man.  It  is  one 
of  the  Sergeant's  favorite  canons  that  the  lower  orders  of  the 
animal  creation  should  join  in  the  celebration  of  the  seventh 
day,  and  contribute  the  offering  of  their  involuntary  homage. 
Loosened  himself  from  the  rich  wain  of  his  profession,  he  ex- 
tends a  similar  indulgence  to  the  gentle  quadrupeds,  who  are 
relieved  on  that  day  from  the  easy  obligation  of  drawing  one 
of  the  handsomest  equipages  in  Dublin,  to  which,  in  all  proba- 
bility, the  chariots  of  the  primitive  Christians  did  not  bear  a 
very  exact  resemblance. 

If  you  should  chance  on  Sunday  to  walk  near  the  Asylum 
(a  chapel  in  Leeson  street,  which,  from  the  number  of  sancti- 
monious lawyers  who  inhabit  it,  is  called  "  Swaddling  bar"), 
you  will  see  the  learned  Sergeant  proceeding  to  this  favored 
domicil  of  worship,  near  which  he  resides  without  any  verifi- 
cation of  the  proverb,  with  a  huge  bible  bound  in  red  morocco 
under  his  arm.  It  is  a  truly  edifying  spectacle.  A  halo  of 
piety  is  diffused  about  him.  His  cheeks,  so  far  from  being 
worn  out  by  the  vigils  of  his  profession,  or  suffused  with  the 
evaporations  of  the  midnight  lamp,  are  bright,  shining,  and 
vermilioned.  There  is  a  gloss  of  sanctity  upon  them,  which  is 
happily  contrasted  with  the  care-colored  visages  of  the  profane. 
A  serious  contentedness  is  observable  in  his  aspect,  which  in- 
dicates a  mind  on  the  best  footing  with  Heaven  and  with  itself. 

There  is  an  evangelical  neatness  in  his  attire.  His  neck- 
cloth is  closely  tied,  and  knotted  with  a  simple  precision.  His 
suit  of  sables,  in  the  formality  of  its  outline,  bears  attestation 
to  the  stitches  of  some  inspired  tailor  who  alternately  cuts  out 
a  religion  and  a  coat;  his  hose  are  of  gray  silk;  his  shoes  are 
burnished  with  a  mysterious  polish,  black  as  the  lustre  of  his 
favorite  Tertullian.  As  he  passes  to  the  house  of  worship,  he 
attracts  the  pious  notice  of  the  devouter  fair  who  flock  to  the 
windows  to  behold  him  ;  but,  heedless  of  their  perilous  admi- 
ration, he  advances  without  any  indulgence  of  human  vanity, 
and  joins  the  convocation  of  the  elect.  There  his  devotion  ex- 
hales itself  in  enraptured  evaporations,  which  nothing  but  the 
recognition  of  some  eminent  solicitor  in  the  adjoining  pew  can 
interrupt.     The  service  being  over,  he  proceeds  to  fill  up  the 


220  taoMAS  LEtfiio-$r. 

residue  of  the  day  with  acts  of  religious  merit,  and,  as  I  have 
heard,  with  deeds  of  genuine  humanity  and  worth. 

With  him,  I  really  believe  that  upon  a  day  which  he  sets 
apart  from  worldly  occupation,  with  perhaps  too  much  Puritan 
exactness,  "  works  of  mercy  are  a  part  of  rest."  While  I  ven- 
ture to  indulge  in  a  little  ridicule  of  his  Sabbatarian  precision, 
which  is  not  wholly  free  from  that  sort  of  pedantry  which  is 
observable  in  religion  as  well  as  in  learning,  I  should  regret  to 
withhold  from  him  the  encomium  which  he  really  deserves. 
It  has  been  whispered,  it  is  true,  that  his  compassion  is,  in  a 
great  degree,  instigated  by  his  theological  predilections,  and 
that  it  has  as  much  of  sectarianism  as  of  philanthropy.  But 
humanity,  however  modified,  is  still  humanity.  If,  in  leaving 
the  chamber  of  suffering  and  of  sorrow,  he  marks  with  a  bank- 
note the  leaf  of  the  Bible  which  he  has  been  reading  at  the 
bedside  of  some  poorer  saint,  let  there  be  given  to  his  benevo- 
lence, restricted  as  it  may  be  by  his  peculiar  propensities  in 
belief,  a  cordial  praise.  The  sphere  of  charity  must  needs  be 
limited ;  and  of  his  own  money,  it  is  a  clear  truism  to  say,  he 
is  entitled  to  dispose  as  he  thinks  proper.  With  respect  to  the 
public  money,  the  case  is  different;  and  upon  the  distribution 
of  a  fund  of  which  he  and  certain  other  gentlemen  of  his  pro- 
fession are  the  trustees  (so  at  least  they  have  made  themselves), 
there  appears  less  right  to  exercise  a  summary  discretion.  I 
allude  to  the  Kildare-street  Association,  of  which  he  is  one  of 
the  principal  members. 

The  street  from  which  this  association  has  derived  its  name 
has  brought  the  extremes  in  morals  into  a  close  conjunction. 
The  Pharisees  of  Dublin  have  posted  themselves  in  a  most 
Sadducean  vicinage,  for  their  meetings  are  held  beside  the 
most  fashionnble  gaming-club*  in  Ireland.  Loud  indeed  and 
long  are  the  oratorical  ejaculations  which  issue  from  the  as- 
semblies held  under  the  peculiar  auspices  of  the  illuminated 
associates  of  the  long  robe.  Here  they  hold  out  a  useful  exam- 
ple of  prudence  as  well  as  of  zeal,  and  indulge  their  generous 
propensities  at  little  cost. 

They  receive,  by  parliamentary  grant,  an  annual  sum  of  six 

*  DaJv's  Club-House.  —  M 


EDUCATION    IN    IRELAND.  221 

thousand  pounds  for  the  education  of  the  poor;*  and  by  a  pro- 
digious stretch  of  individual  beneficence,  a  hundred  guineas 
are  added  through  a  private  subscription  among  the  elect.  In 
the  allocation  of  this  fund,  they  have  established  rules  which 
are  entirely  at  variance  with  the  ends  for  which  the  grant  has 
been  made  by  Parliament.  They  require  that  the  Bible  should, 
be  read  in  every  school  to  which  assistance  is  given.  With 
this  condition  the  Roman  Catholic  clergy  (and  the  chief  among 
the  Protestant  hierarch)  concur  in  their  opposition)  have  re- 
fused to  comply.  The  indiscriminate  perusal  of  the  Scriptures, 
unaccompanied  by  any  comment  illustrative  of  the  peculiar 
sense  in  which  they  are  explained  by  the  Roman  Catholic 
church,  seems  to  be  inconsistent  with  the  principles  in  which 
that  church  is  founded.  The  divines  of  Kildare  street  have, 
however,  undertaken  the  difficult  task  of  demonstrating  to  this 
obstinate  and  refractory  priesthood  that  they  understood  the 
tenets  and  spirit  of  their  religion  much  better  than  any  doctor 
at  Maynooth.t  A  consequent  acrimony  has  arisen  between 
the  parties,  and  the  result  has  been  that  the  few  channels  of 
education  which  exist  in  the  country  are  denied  all  supply 
from  a  source  which  has  been  thus  arbitrarily  shut  up. 

It  is  lamentable  that,  in  the  enforcement  of  these  fanatical 
enactments,  so  much  petty  vinclictiveness  and  theological  acer- 
bity should  be  displayed.  The  assemblies  held  at  Kildare 
street,  with  the  ostensible  view  of  advancing  the  progress  of 
intelligence  among  the  lower  classes,  exhibit  many  of  the  qual- 
ities of  sectarian  virulence  in  their  most  ludicrous  shape.  A 
few  individuals  who  presume  to  dissent  from  the  august  authori- 
ties who  preside  at  these  meetings,  occasionally  venture  to 
enter  their  public  protest  against  both  the  right  and  the  pro- 
priety of  imposing  a  virtually  impracticable  condition  upon  the 
allocation  of  the  parliamentary  fund.  Lord  Cloncurry  implores 
them,  with  an  honest  frankness,  to  abandon  their  proselytizing 

*  This  grant  has  been  withdrawn  for  some  years,  and  what  is  called  the  Na 
tional  has  superseded  the  Kildare-street  system  of  education.  —  M. 

t  The  Roman  Catholic  College  of  Maynooth,  endowed  by  Parliament,  for  the 
education  of  young  men  destined  for  the  Church.  They  previously  had  to  go 
tfl  France  or  Italy  for  that  purpose.  —  M, 


222  THOMAS    LEFROY. 

speculation.  O'Oonnell,  too,  wlio  "like  a  French  falcon  flies 
at  everything  lie  sees,"  comes  panting  from  the  Four  Courts, 
and  gives  them  a  speech  straight.  The  effects  produced  upon 
the  auditory,  which  is  compounded  of  very  different  materials 
from  the  meetings  which  the  counsellor  is  in  the  habit  of  ad- 
dressing with  so  much  success,  are  not  a  little  singular. 

Of  the  ingredients  of  this  assembly  it  may  not  be  amiss  to 
say  a  few  words.  Aware  of  his  purpose,  the  Saints  employ 
themselves  for  some  days  before  in  congregating  all  those  who 
hold  his  politics  and  his  creed  in  their  most  special  abhorrence. 
They  accordingly  collect  a  very  motley  convocation.  In  the 
background  are  posted  a  strong  phalanx  of  the  ragged  and 
ferocious  votaries  of  Mr.  Cooper.*  These  persons  belong  to 
the  lower  classes  of  Protestants,  of  whose  religion  it  would  not 
be  easy  to  give  any  more  definite  description  than  that  they 
regard  the  Plunket-street  orator  as  on  a  very  close  footing  with 
the  Divinity,  and  entertain  shrewd  doubts  whether  he  be  not 
the  prophet  Enoch  himself.  Adjoining  to  this  detachment, 
which  is  posted  as  a  kind  of  corps  de  reserve,  whose  aid  is  to  be 
resorted  to  upon  a  case  of  special  emergency,  the  Evangelicals 
of  York  street  are  drawn  up.  Next  come  a  chosen  band  of 
Quakers  and  Quakeresses;  and  lastly  are  arrayed  the  Saints, 
more  properly  so  called,  with  the  learned  Sergeant  and  divers 
oily-tongued  barristers  at  their  head.  The  latter  are  judi- 
ciously dispersed  among  the  pretty  enthusiasts  who  occupy  the 
front  benches,  and  whisper  a  compliment  in  the  ear  of  some 
soft-eyed  votary,  who  bears  the  seal  of  grace  upon  her  smooth 
and  ivory  brow. 

It  may  not  be  inappropriate  to  observe,  that  among  the 
softer  sex  the  Saints  have  made  very  considerable  way.  The 
cold  worship  of  the  establishment  is  readily  abandoned  for  the 
more  impassioned  adoration  which  corrects  the  tameness  and 
frigidity  of  the  constituted  creed.  The  latter  is,  indeed,  a  kind 
of  Catholicism  cut  down ;  it  is  popery  without  enthusiasm  ; 
and  to  remedy  its  want  of  stimulus,  an  exciting  system  has 
been  devised,  the  practices  and  tenets  of  which  are  endowed 

*  An  "  unco  pious"  pillar  of  the  Protestant  ascendency  party  in  Dublin  \n 
!8f?3,  when  this  paper  was  v Tit-ten.  —  M, 


O'CONNELL    ON    THE    BIBLE.  22& 

with  a  peculiar  pungency.  The  Kildare  street  meetings  are 
attended  by  some  of  the  prettiest  women  in  Dublin;  and  I 
should  say,  in  justice  to  these  tender  devotees,  that  they  ap- 
pear there  with  a  peculiar  interest.  There  is  a  studied  mod- 
esty in  their  attire  that  only  excites  the  imaginations  which  it 
purposes  to  repress. 

In  this  scene,  thus  strangely  compounded,  it  is  pleasant  to 
see  the  Popish  agitator  engaged  in  a  wrestle  with  the  passions 
and  antipathies  of  his  hearers.  The  moment  he  rises,  an  ob- 
scure murmur,  or  rather  growl,  is  heard  in  the  more  distant 
parts  of  the  room.  This  discourteous  sound  proceeds  from  the 
Cooperites,  who  find  it  difficult  to  restrain  themselves  from  any 
stronger  expression  of  abhorrence  toward  this  poisoned  scioii 
of  St.  Omer's.*  The  politer  portion  of  the  audience  interfere; 
and  the  learned  Sergeant  entreats  that  he  may  be  heard. 

O'Oonnell  proceeds,  and  professes  as  strong  and  unaffected 
a  veneration  for  the  Holy  Writings  as  any  of  them  can  enter- 
tain ;  but  at  the  same  time  begs  to  insinuate,  that  the  Bible  is 
not  only  the  repository  of  Divine  truths,  but  the  record  of 
human  depravity,  and  that,  as  a  narrative,  it  comprehends 
examples  of  atrocity,  with  the  detail  of  which  it  is,  perhaps, 
injudicious  that  youth  and  innocence  should  become  familiar, 
Are  crimes  which  rebel  against  nature,  the  fit  theme  of  domes- 
tic contemplation?  and  are  not  facts  set  forth  in  the  Old 
Testament,  from  the  very  knowledge  of  which  every  "father 
should  desire  to  secure  his  child  ?  If  he  were  desperate  enough 
to  open  the  Holy  Writings  in  that  very  assembly,  and  to  read 
aloud  the  examples  of  guilt  which  they  commemorate,  the  face 
of  every  woman  would  turn  to  scarlet,  and  the  hand  of  every 
man  would  be  lifted  up  in  wrath  :  and  are  the  pages  which 
reveal  the  darkest  depths  of  depravity  fitted  for  the  specula- 
tions of  boyhood  and  the  virgin's  meditations?  Will  not  the 
question  be  asked,  What  does  all  this  mean  1  and  is  it  right 
that  such  a  question  should  be  put,  to  which  such  an  answer 
may  be  given  1     The  field  of  conjecture  ought  not  to  be  opened 

*  O'Connell,  it  should  be  borne  in  mind,  was  originally  intended  for  the 
orlesthood,  and  received  his  early  education  at  the  college  of  St  Omer,  in 
France. —  M, 


224  THOMAS   LEFEOT. 

to  those  whose  innocence  and  whose  ignorance  are  so  closely 
allied.  Sacred  as  the  tree  of  knowledge  may  appear,  and 
although  it  grow  beside  that  of  life,  its  fruits  are  full  of  bitter- 
ness and  death. 

Mr.  O'Connell  then  insists  that  the  Scriptures  ought  not  to 
be  forced  into  circulation,  and  that  a  bounty  should  not  be  put 
upon  their  dispersion  among  the  shoeless,  noseless,  shirtless, 
and  houseless  peasantry  of  Ireland.  Give  them  work  and  food 
instead  of  theology.  Are  they  capable  of  comprehending  the 
dark  and  mysterious  intimations  of  St.  Paul,  or  St.  John's 
Revelation  ?  Would  not  the  Apocalypse  bother  the  learned 
Sergeant  himself?  and  have  not  his  poor  countrymen  enough 
to  endure,  and  are  they  not  sufficiently  disposed  to  quarrel, 
without  the  additional  incentive  of  polemics'?  Is  it  in  a  ditch 
school  that  his  learned  friend  conceives  that  the  mysteries  of 
the  Trinity,  of  the  Incarnation,  and  not  more  embarrassing 
Sacrament,  are  to  be  discussed  % 

Kindling  as  he  advances,  the  great  demagogue  throws  him- 
self into  other  topics,  and  charges  his  pious  friends  with  a 
violation  of  their  duty  to  the  public,  in  the  arbitrary  imposition 
of  conditions  against  which  every  Roman  Catholic  exclaims. 
He  disputes  their  right  to  exercise  a  compulsion  founded  on 
their  own  fantasies  in  the  execution  of  a  solemn  trust,  and  at 
last  roundly  insinuates  that  proselytism  must  be  their  object. 

At  this  a  mighty  uproar  ensues.  The  holy  rabble  in  the 
distance  send  up  a  tremendous  shout :  their  Bibles  are  brand- 
ished—  their  eyes  gleam  with  a  more  deadly  fire  —  and  their 
faces  become  more  formidably  grim: — a  thrill  of  indignation 
runs  through  the  whole  assembly  —  the  spirit,  of  Obadiah  himself 
is  moved  within  him,  and  even  the  ladies  allow  the  fierce  infec- 
tion to  make  its  way  into  their  gentle  and  forbearing  breasts. 
A  universal  sibilation  is  heard  —  mouths  that  pout  and  mince 
their  orisons  with  Madonna  sweetness  are  suddenly  distorted 
—  a  hiss  issues  from  the  lips  of  roses,  and  intimates  the  venom 
that  lurks  beneath.  O'Connell  struggles  hard  and  long,  but  he 
is  at  length  fairly  shouted  down, 

In  the  midst  of  this  stormy  confusion,  the  learned  Sergeant 
appears,  and  the  moment  his  tall  and  slender  person  is  pre- 


AT   A    KILDARE   STREET    MEETING.  225 

sented  to  tlieir  notice,  a  deep  and  reverential  silence  pervades 
the  meeting.     The  previous  tumult  is  followed  by  attention 

"  Still  as  night,  or  summer's  noontide  air" — 

the  ladies  resume  their  suavity,  and  look  angelical  again  ;  and 
the  men  chuckle  at  his  anticipated  triumphs  over  the  far-famed 
missionary  of  Antichrist. 

To  pursue  tlieir  champion  through  his  victorious  reply  would 
swell  my  pages  beyond  their  fitting  compass ;  suffice  it  to  say, 
that  he  satisfactorily  demonstrates  the  propriety  of  teaching  the 
alphabet  from  the  Prophecies,  and  turning  the  Apocalypse  into 
a  primer.  He  points  out  the  manifold  advantages  of  familiar- 
izing the  youthful  mind  with  the  history  of  the  Jews..  The 
applauses  of  his  auditors,  and  his  own  heated  conviction  (for 
he  is  quite  sincere),  inflame  him  into  emotions  which  bear  a 
resemblance  to  eloquence,  and  raise  his  language  beyond  its 
ordinary  tone.  The  feelings  nearest  to  his  heart  ascend  to  his 
mind,  and  communicate  their  effervescence.  His  phrase  is 
struck  with  the  stamp  of  passion.  His  eye  becomes  ennobled 
with  better  thought;  he  shuffles  off  for  a  moment  the  coil  of 
his  forensic  habitudes.  The  universal  diffusion  of  Christian 
truth  fills  him  with  enthusiasm.  He  beholds  the  downfall  of 
Popery  in  the  opening  dimness  of  time.  Every  chapel  is 
touched  by  that  harlequin  the  fancy  into  a  conventicle.  The 
mass  bells  are  cracked,  and  the  pots  of  lustral  water  are  shat- 
tered. A  millennium  of  Methodism  succeeds.  A  new  Jerusa- 
lem arises.  The  Jews  are  converted  (a  favorite  project  with 
the  Sergeant,  who  holds  an  annual  meeting  for  the  purpose) ; 
all  Monmouth  street  is  illuminated;  its  tattered  robes  are 
turned  into  mantles  of  glory.  The  temple  is  rebuilt  upon  an 
exact  model  of  the  Four-Courts.  The  Harlot  of  Babylon  is 
stripped  stark-naked,  and  the  cardinals  are  given  over  to  Sir 
Harcourt  Lees.  At  length  the  vision  becomes  too  radiant 
for  endurance.  A  third  heaven  opens  upon  him,  and  he  sinks 
exhausted  by  his  enjoyments,  and  perspiring  with  ecstasy, 
amid  the  transports  of  auditors  to  whom  he  imparts  a  rapture 
almost  equal  to  his  own. 

Let  me  conduct  the  reader  from  Kildare  street  to  the  Court 

10* 


226  THOMAS   LEFEOY. 

of  Chancery.  Here  an  utter  transformation  takes  place  in  the 
person  of  the  learned  Sergeant,  which  almost  brings  his  iden- 
tity into  doubt.  Instead  of  eyes  alternately  veiled  in  the 
humility  of  their  long  and  downcast  lashes,  or  lifted  up  in 
visionary  devotion,  you  behold  them  fixed  upon  the  Chan- 
cellor, and  watching  with  a  subtle  intensity  all  the  shiftings 
of  expression  with  which  the  judicial  countenance  intimates 
its  approval  or  dissent.  The  whole  face  of  the  vigilant  and 
wily  pleader  is  overspread  with  craft.  There  is  a  lurking  of 
design  in  every  feature  of  his  sharp  and  elongated  visage. 
You  will  not  perceive  any  nice  play  of  the  muscles,  or  shad- 
owings  of  sentiment  in  his  physiognomy  ;  it  is  fixed,  hard, 
and  imperturbable.  His  deportment  is  in  keeping  with  his 
countenance.  He  scarcely  ever  stands  perfectly  erect,  and 
there  is  nothing  upright  or  open  in  his  bearing.  His  shoulders 
are  contracted,  and  drawn  in  ;  and  the  body  is  bent,  while  the 
neck  is  protruded.  No  rapidity  of  gesture,  or  suddenness  of 
movement,  indicates  the  unanticipated  startings-np  of  thought. 
The  arm  is  never  braced  in  the  strenuous  confidence  of  vigor- 
ous enforcement,  with  which  Plunket  hurls  the  truth  at  the 
Bench  ;  but  the  long  and  taper  fingers  just  tip  the  green  table 
on  which  they  are  laid  with  a  peculiar  lightness.  In  this  atti- 
tude, in  which  he  looks  a  sophism  personified,  he  applies  his 
talents  and  erudition  to  the  sustainment  of  the  most  question- 
able case,  with  as  much  alacrity  as  if  weeping  Innocence  and 
virtuous  Misfortune  clung  to  him  for  support. 

The  doubtful  merits  of  his  client  seem  to  give  a  new  stim- 
ulus to  his  abilities;  and  if  some  obsolete  form  can  be  raised 
from  oblivion,  if  some  preposterous  precedent  can  be  found  in 
the  mass  of  antiquated  decisions  under  which  all  reason  and 
justice  are  entombed  ;  or  if  some  petty  flaw  can  be  found  in 
the  pleadings  of  his  adversary,  which  is  sure  to  be  detected 
by  his  minute  and  microscopic  eye,  wo  to  the  widow  and  tlie 
orphan  !  The  Chancellor  [Manners]  is  called  upon  to  decide 
in  conformity  with  some  old  monastic  doctrine.  The  pious 
Sergeant  presses  him  upon  every  side.  He  surrounds  him 
with  a  horde  of  barbarous  authorities  ;  and  giving  no  quarter 
tv>   common   sense,  and   having  beaten  equity   down,  and   laid 


AS   AN    ADVOCATE.  227 

Bimple  honesty  prostrate,  lie  sets  up  the  factious  demurrer  and 
the  malicious  plea  in  trophy  upon  their  ruins.  Every  expe- 
dient is  called  into  aid  :  facts  are  perverted,  precedents  are 
tortured,  positions  unheard  before  are  laid  down  as  sacred 
canons  ;  and,  in  order  to  effect  the  utter  wreck  of  the  opposite 
party,  deceitful  lights  are  held  up  as  the  great  beacons  of 
legal  truth.  In  short,  one  who  had  previously  seen  the 
learned  Sergeant  for  the  first  time  in  a  Bible  Society,  would 
hardly  believe  him  to  be  the  same,  but  would  almost  be  in- 
clined to  suspect  that  it  was  the  genius  of  Chicane,  which  had 
invested  itself  with  an  angelic  aspect,  and,  for  the  purpose  of 
more  effectually  accomplishing  its  pernicious  ends,  had  as- 
sumed the  celestial  guise  of  Mr.  Sergeant  Lefroy. 

Let  me  not  be  considered  as  casting  an  imputation  upon  this 
able,  and,  I  believe,  amiable  man.  In  the  exhibition  of  so 
much  professional  dexterity  and  zeal,  he  does  no  more  than 
what  every  advocate  will  regard  as  his  duty.  I  am  only 
indulging  in  some  surprise  at  the  promptness  and  facility  of 
his  transition  from  the  religious  to  the  forensic  mood  ;  and  at 
the  success  with  which  he  divests  himself  of  that  moral  squeam- 
ishness,  which  one  would  suppose  to  be  incidental  to  his  intel- 
lectual habits.  Looking  at  him  as  an  advocate,  he  deserves 
great  encomium.  In  industry  he  is  not  surpassed  by  any  mem- 
ber of  his  profession. 

It  Avas  his  good  fortune  that,  soon  after  he  had  been  called 
to  the  bar,  Lord  Redesdale  should  have  been  Lord  Chancellor.* 

*  Lord  Redesdale,  born  in  August,  1748,  was  an  excellent  Chancellor  —  dear 
minded,  straight-forward,  learned,  and  patient.  His  name  was  John  Fi'eeman 
Mitford,  and  he  was  English  by  birth.  He  was  educated  at  Oxford,  studied 
the  law,  and  became  an  eminent  chancery  pleader,  after  he  was  called  to  the 
bar.  He  wrote  a  book  on  Chancery  Pleadings,  which  went  through  several 
editions.  In  1790,  he  was  made  a  Welsh  judge  (an  office  now  abolished)  and 
Was  knighted  in  17.03,  when  he  was  appointed  Solicitor-General.  He  had  to 
appear  against  Mr.  Hardy,  tried  on  a  cbarge  of  high  ti'eason,  and  his  opening 
speech  was  distinguished  by  moderation,  good  taste,  and  acuteness.  In  1799. 
he  succeeded  Scott  (Lord  Eldon)  as  Attorney-General.  He  had  been  in  Par- 
liament since  17  85,  and,  in  1801,  was  elected  Speaker,  the  first  and  highest  of- 
fice a  Commoner  can  hold  in  England.  In  1802,  on  being  appointed  Lord 
Chancellor  of  Ireland,  he  was  raised  to  the  peerage,  as  Lord  Redes  lale.  When 
Grenville  and  Fox  formed  their  Coalition  Ministry,  in  1806,  he  was  compelled  lm 


228  THOMAS    LEFROY. 

That  great  lawyer  introduced  a  reformation  in  Irish  practice. 
He  substituted  great  learning,  unwearied  diligence,  and  a 
spirit  of  scientific  discussion,  for  the  flippant  apothegms  and 
irritable  self-sufficiency  of  the  late  Lord  Clare.  He  enter- 
tained an  honorable  passion  for  the  study,  as  well  as  for  the 
profits  of  his  profession  ;  and,  not  satisfied  with  pronouncing 
judgments  which  adjusted  the  rights  of  the  immediate  parties, 
he  disclosed  the  foundations  of  his  decisions,  and,  opening  the 
deep  ground-work  of  equity,  revealed  the  principles  upon  which 
the  whole  edifice  is  established. 

The  value  of  these  essays  delivered  from  the  Bench  was 
well  appreciated  by  Mr.  Lefroy,  who,  in  conjunction  with  Mr. 
Schoales,  engaged  in  the  reports  Avhich  bear  their  names,  and 
which  are  justly  held  in  so  much  esteem.  Soon  after  their 
publication,  Mr.  Lefroy  rose  into  business,  for  which  he  was  in 
every  way  qualified.  He  was  much  favored  by  Lord  Redes- 
dale,  and  iioav  enjoys  the  warm  friendship  of  Lord  Manners 
[1823],  for  whom  he  acts  as  confidential  counsel.*  His  great 
familiarity  with  cases,  and  a  spirit  of  peculiar  deference  to  his 
Lordship,  combined  with  eminent  capacity,  have  secured  for 
him  a  large  portion  of  the  judicial  partialities.  He  is  in 
the  fullest  practice,  and,  taking  his  private  and  professional 
income  into  account,  may  be  well  regarded  as  the  wealthiest 

resign,  for,  on  taking  leave  of  the  bar,  he  said  that  "  he  had  hoped  to  have  ended 
his  days  in  Ireland,  but  was  not  permitted.  His  consent  to  depart  from  Eng- 
land was  yielded  at  the  wish  of  some  who  now  concurred  in  his  removal '  this 
he  owned,  he  did  not  expect."  On  his  return  to  England,  he  strongly  opp  v^d 
the  ministry,  particularly  on  Lord  Grenville's  motion  for  Catholic  Emanc.pa- 
tion.  His  future  political  course  was  anti-liberal.  In  Committees  of  Appeal, 
in  the  Lords,  bis  opinion  had  great  weight.  He  originated  the  humane  meas- 
ure for  the  relief  of  insolvent  debtors.  His  death  took  place,  on  the  16th  Jan 
uary,  1830.  His  only  son,  the  present  Lord  Redesdale,  is  Chairman  of  Com- 
mittees in  the  House  of  Lords,  with  a  salary  of  four  thousand  pounds  sterling 
a  year,  and  also  Deputy-Speaker  of  that  house.  His  previous  qualifications 
appear  to  have  been  —  that  he  kept  a  pack  of  hounds  !  —  M. 

*  In  England  and  Ireland  it  is  not  uncommon  for  a  Judge  to  employ  a  bar- 
rister in  whom  he  has  confidence,  to  assist  him  in  looking  up  the  law  in  diffi- 
cult cases.  The  person  employed  is  called  the  Judge's  "  Devil."  The  law 
officers  of  the  Crown  have  like  assistance,  and  the  hamsters  who  work  for  them 
reap  a  rich  harvest,  by  being  usually  employed  as  junior  counsel  in  the  case* 
in  ^'hich  their  superiors  receive  retainers  and  hold  briefs. —  M. 


AGRARIAN  INSURRECTION.  229 

man  at  the  Irish  bar.  His  great  fortune,  however,  has  not  had 
the  effect  of  impairing  in  him  the  spirit  of  acquisition.  He 
exhibits,  indeed,  as  acute  a  perception  of  pecuniary  excitement 
as  any  of  his  less  devout  brethren  of  the  coif. 

Sergeant  Lefroy  will,  in  all  likelihot.  i,  be  shortly  raised  to 
the  Bench.*  He  has  already  officiated  upon  one  occasion  as 
a  judge  of  assize,  in  consequence  of  the  illness  of  some  of  the 
regular  judges,  and  gone  the  Minister  circuit.  His  opinions 
and  demeanor  in  this  capacity  are  not  undeserving  of  men- 
tion :  they  have  attracted  much  attention  in  Ireland,  and  in 
England  have  not  escaped  observation.  Armed  with  the 
king's  commission,  he  arrived  in  Limerick  in  the  midst  of  those 
dreadful  scenes,  to  which  no  country  in  Europe  affords  a 
parallel.f  All  the  mounds  of  civil  institutions  appeared  to 
have  been  carried  away  by  the  dark  and  overwhelming  tide, 
which  was  running  with  a  tremendous  current,  and  swelling 
every  day  into  a  more  portentous  magnitude.  Social  order 
seemed  to  be  at  an  end.  A  wild  and  furious  population,  barba- 
rized by  a  heartless  and  almost  equally  savage  gentry,  had 
burst  through  the  bonds  by  which  its  madness  had  been 
hitherto  restrained,  and  rushed  into  an  insurrection,  in  which 
the  animosities  of  a  civil  were  blended  with  the  ferocity  of  a 
servile  war.  Revenge  and  hunger  employed  their  united 
excitations  in  working  up  this  formidable  insanity.  Reckless 
of  the  loss  of  an  existence  which  afforded  them  no  enjoyment, 
the  infuriated  victims  of  the  landlord  and  the  tithe-proctor 
extended  to  the  lives  of  others  the  same  estimate  which  they 
set  upon  their  own  ;  and  their  appreciation  of  the  value  of 
human  breath  was  illustrated  in  the  daily  assassinations,  which 
were  devised  with  the  guile,  and  perpetrated  with  the  fury,  of 
an  Indian  tribe.  The  whole  country  smoked  with  the  traces 
of  devastation — blood  was  shed  at  noon  upon  the  public  way 
—  and  crimes  even  more  dreadful  than  murder  made  every 
parent  tremble. 

*  He  is  now  [1854],  Chief-Justice  of  the  Queen's  Bench,  having  been  ap- 
pointed in  1852,  when  Mr.  Blackburne  was  made  Chancellor. —  M. 

t  The  agrarian  disturbances  of  1821,  chiefly  arising  out  of  the  demands  on 
the  Catholics  for  tithes,  io  support  the  rich  Protestant  Church  — M, 


230  THOMAS   lEFROY. 

Such  was  the  situation  of  the  county  of  Limerick,  when  tha 
learned  Sergeant  arrived  to  administer  a  remedy  for  these 
frightful  evils.  The  calendar  presented  almost  all  the  possi- 
ble varieties  which  guilt  could  assume,  and  might  be  desig- 
nated as  a  hideous  miscellany  of  crime.  The  court-house 
exhibited  an  appalling  spectacle.  A  deep  and  awful  silence 
hung  heavily  upon  it,  and  the  consciousness  that  lay  upon 
every  man's  heart,  of  the  frightful  crisis  to  which  the  county 
seemed  rapidly  advancing,  bound  up  the  very  breath  of  the 
assembly  in  a  fearful  hush.  The  wretched  men  in  the  dock 
stood  before  the  judicial  novice  in  a  heedless  certainty  of  their 
fate.  A  desperate  independence  of  their  destiny  seemed  to 
dilate  their  broad  and  expanded  chests,  and  their  powerful 
faces  gave  a  gloomy  token  of  their  sullen  indifference  to  death. 
Their  confederates  in  guilt  stood  around  them  with  much 
stronger  intimations  of  anxiety  in  their  looks,  and,  as  they 
eyed  their  fellow-conspirators  in  the  dock,  seemed  to  mutter  a 
vow  of  vengeance  for  every  hair  that  should  be  touched  upon 
their  heads.  The  gentry  of  the  county  stood  in  the  galleries 
with  a  kind  of  confession  in  their  aspect,  that  they  had  them- 
selves been  participant  in  the  production  of  the  crimes  which 
they  were  collected  to  punish,  but  which  they  knew  that  they 
could  not  repress. 

In  this  assembly,  so  silent  that  the  unsheathing  of  a  stiletto 
might  have  been  heard  amidst  its  hush,  the  learned  Sergeant 
rose,  and  called  for  the  piece  of  parchment  in  which  an  indict- 
ment had  been  written.  It  was  duly  presented  to  him  by  the 
clerk  of  the  crown.  Lifting  up  the  legal  scroll,  he  paused  for 
a  moment,  and  said  :  "  Behold  !  in  this  parchment  writing,  the 
causes  of  all  the  misery  with  which  the  Lord  has  afflicted  this 
unhappy  island  are  expressed.  Here  is  the  whole  mystery 
of  guilt  manifestly  revealed.  All,  all  is  intimated  in  the  in- 
dictment. Unhappy  men,  you  have  not  the  fear  of  God  be- 
fore your  eyes,  and  you  are  moved  by  the  instigations  of  the 
Devil."  This  address  went  beyond  all  expectation  —  the 
wretches  in  the  dock  gazed  upon  their  sacred  monitor  with  a 
scowling  stare  —  the  Bar  tipped  each  other  the  wink  —  the 
parsons  thought  that  this  was  a  palpable  interference  with  my 


CAPTAIN    ROCK.  231 

lord  the  bishop  —  the  O'Gradys  thrust  their  tongues  into  their 
cheeks,  and  O'Oonnell  cried  out,  "Leather!" 

I  have  no  room  to  transcribe  the  rest  of  this  remarkable 
charge.  It  corresponded  with  the  specimen  already  given, 
and  verified  the  reference  to  the  fabulist.  So,  indeed,  does 
every  charge  delivered  from  the  Irish  Bench.  Each  man 'in- 
dulges in  his  peculiar  propensities.  Shed  blood  enough,  cries 
old  Renault.*  Be  just,  be  humane,  be  merciful,  says  Bushe. 
While  the  learned  Sergeant  charges  a  confederacy  between 
Beelzebub  and  Captain  Rock,  imputes  the  atrocities  of  the 
South  to  an  immediate  diabolical  interposition,  and  lays  at  the 
Devil's  door  all  the  calamities  of  Ireland. 

*  This  mild-tempered  gentleman  may  be  remembered  as  one  of  tl  e  charac- 
ters in  Otvay's  very  tragic  tragedy  of  "  Venice  Preserved."— M. 


THOMAS    GOOLD. 

The  French  Revolution  had  scarcely  burst  upon  the  world, 
and  its  portentous  incidents  were  still  the  daily  subject  of 
universal  astonishment  or  dismay,  when  there  arose  in  the 
metropolis  of  Ireland  a  young  gentleman,  who,  feeling  jealous 
ot  the  unrivalled  importance  which  the  Continental  phenome- 
non was  enjoying,  resolved  to  start  in  his  own  person  as  an  op- 
position-wonder. He  had  some  of  the  qualifications  and  all  the 
ambitious  self-dependence  befitting  so  arduous  a  project.  Na- 
ture and  fortune  had  been  extremely  kind  to  him.  He  was 
of  a  respectable  and  wealthy  family.  His  face  was  handsome ; 
his  person  small,  but  symmetrical  and  elastic,  and  peculiarly 
adapted  to  the  performance  of  certain  bodily  feats  which  he 
subsequently  achieved. 

As  to  his  general  endowments,  he  was,  upon  his  own  show- 
ing, &  facsimile  of  the  admirable  Orichton.  He  announced 
himself  as  an  adept  in  every  known  department  of  human 
learning,  from  the  prophetic  revelations  of  judicial  astrology, 
and  the  more  obsolete  mysteries  of  magic  lore,  up  to  the  light- 
est productions  of  the  amatory  muse  of  France.  He  professed 
to  speak  every  language  (except  the  Irish)  as  fluently  and 
correctly  as  if  he  had  been  a  native  born.  He  played,  sung, 
danced,  fenced,  and  rode,  with  more  skill  and  spirit  than  the 
masters  of  those  respective  arts  who  had  presumed  to  teach 
him.  He  had  a  deep  sense  of  the  value  of  so  many  combined 
perfections,  and  acted  under  the  persuasion  that  he  was  called 
upon  to  amaze  the  world. 

His  friends,  who  had  perceived  that  beneath  his  incompre- 
hensible aspirations  there  lurked  the  elements  of  a  clever  man, 


SOWING    HIS   WILD    OATS.  233 

recommended  the  Bar  as  a  profession  in  which,  with  indus- 
try, and  his  c£10, 000,  for  he  inherited  about  as  much,  and  a 
rising  religion,  for  he  was  a  Protestant,  he  might  fairly  hope 
to  gratify  their  ambition,  if  not  his  own.  He  assented  ;  and 
submitted  to  pass  through  the  preliminary  forms  —  rather, 
however,  under  the  idea,  that  at  some  future  period  it  might 
suit  his  views  to  accept  the  chancellorship  of  Ireland,  than 
with  any  immediate  intention  of  squandering  his  youthful  en- 
ergies upon  so  inglorious  a  vocation.  He  felt  that  he  was  des- 
tined for  higher  things,  and  proceeded  to  assert  his  claims. 
He' never  appeared  abroad  but  in  a  costly  suit  of  the  most  per- 
suasive cut,  and  glowing  with  bright  and  various  tints.  He 
set  up  an  imposing  phaeton,  in  which  with  Kitty  Cut-a  dash, 
of  fascinating  memory,  and  then  the  reigning  illegitimate  belle 
of  Dublin,  by  his  side,  he  scoured  through  streets  and  squares 
with  the  brilliancy  and  rapidity  of  an  optical  illusion.  He  en- 
tertained his  friends,  the  choicest  spirits  about  town,  with  din- 
ners, such  as  bachelor  never  gave  before  —  dishes  so  satisfy- 
ing and  scientific,  as  to  fill  not  only  the  stomach,  but  the  mind 
—  claret,  such  as  few  even  of  the  Irish  bishops  could  procure, 
and  champaigne  of  vivacity  exampled  only  by  his  own.  He 
furnished  his  stable  witli  a  stud  of  racers;  and,  if  I  am  rightly 
informed,  he  still,  half-laughing,  half-wondering  at  his  former 
self,  recalls  the  times  when  mounted  upon  a  favorite  thorough- 
bred, and  flaming  in  a  pink-satin  jockey-dress,  he  distanced 
every  competitor,  and  bore  away  the  Ourragh  cup.* 

I  have  spoken  of  his  dancing.  Tradition  asserts  that  it  was 
not  confined  to  ball-rooms.  I  am  told  that  at  the  private  theatre 
in  Fishamble-street,  a  place  in  those  days  of  much  fashion- 
able resort,  he  was  known  to  slide  in  between  the  acts,  in  the 
costume  of  a  Savoy  peasant,  and  throw  off  a,  pas  seul  in  a  style 
of  original  dexterity  and  grace,  which,  to  use  an  Irish  descrip- 
tive phrase,  "  elicited  explosions  of  applause  from  the  men,  and 
ecstatic  ebullitions  of  admiration  from  the  ladies."  He  Avas 
equally  remarkable  for  his  excellence  in  the  other  manly  ex- 

*  The  principal  races  in  Ireland  take  place  upon  the  Curragh  of  Kildare 
at  once  an  equivalent  for  Don  caster  and  Newmarket,  Epsom  and  Ascot,  with 
Soodwood  and  —  the  rest. —  M. 


234 


THOMAS   GOOLt). 


ercises.  He  thought  nothing  of  vaulting  over  four  horses 
standing  abreast.  He  was  paramount  at  foot-ball ;  and  aston- 
ished and  won  wagers  from  the  Bishop  of  Deny  himself  (the 
noted  Lord  Bristol),*  who  was  supposed  to  be  the  keenest  judge 
in  Ireland  of  what  the  toe  of  man  could  achieve. 

Before  assuming  the  forensic  robe,  our  aspirant  for  renown 
set  out  upon  a  Continental  tour;  and  according  to  his  subse- 
quent report,  although  he  travelled  in  strict  incognito,  gathered 
fresh  glory  at  every  post-town  through  which  he  was  whirled 
along.  After  a  considerable  stay  at  Paris,  where,  however, 
he  arrived  too  late  to  stop  the  revolutionary  torrent,  he 
passed  on  and  visited  several  of  the  German  courts  —  gave 
"  travelling  opinions"  upon  the  course  of  policy  to  be  respec- 
tively pursued  by  them  at  that  critical  juncture,  and  after- 
ward satisfied  himself  that  the  most  important  events  that 
followed  were  mainly  influenced  by  his  timely  interposition. 
He  left  Germany  with  some  precipitation.  The  rumor  ran 
that  there  were  state-reasons  for  his  departure.  The  subject 
was  too  delicate  to  be  revealed  in  all  its  circumstances,  but 
upon  his  return  to  Ireland  his  friends  heard  in  broken  senten- 
ces of  a  certain  Palatine  princess  —  the  dogged  jealousy  of 

*  The  Earl  of  Bristol,  who  was  also  Bishop  of  Deny  (the  income  of  which 
was  twenty  thousand  pounds  sterling  a  year,  at  that  time),  was  a  very  strange 
character.  .He  was  born  in  1730,  and  died  in  1803 — having  spent  the  last 
years  of  his  life  in  Italy,  quite  unmindful  of  his  episcopal  duties  to  his  diocese 
—  but  sacredly  receiving  its  immense  revenue.  He  bitterly  opposed  the 
Union,  and  went  down  to  the  House  of  Lords,  in  a  coach  -drawn  by  eight 
horses,  to  vote  against  it.  He  was  son  of  the  Lord  Hervey  (Keeper  of  the 
Privy  Seal,  in  1740),  to  whom,  thinking  highly  of  his  intellect  and  learning, 
Bishop  Middloton  dedicated  his  "  History  of  the  Life  of  Cicero,"  while  on  the 
other  hand,  he  comes  down  to  us,  as  the  Sporus  of  Pope's  severe  Satire,  in 
which  his  character  is  thus  limned: — 

"  Eternal  smiles  his  emptiness  betray, 
As  shallow  streams  run  dimpling  all  the  way ; 
Whether  in  florid  impotence  he  speaks, 
And,  as  the  Prompter  breathes,  the  puppet  squeaks. 
Eve's  tempter,  thus  the  Rabbins  have  exprest  — 
A  cherub's  face,  a  reptile  all  the  rest, 
Beauty  that  shocks  you,  parts  that  none  can  trust, 
Wit  that  can  creep,  and  pride  that  licks  the  du3t." 
In  Juno,  1826",  th^  Earldom  of  Bristol  was  raised  into  a  Marq  lisate. —  M, 


BROUGHT    TO    A    CHECK.  935 

royal  husbands  —  the  incorrigible  babbling  of  maids  of  honor 
—  muttered  threats  of  incarceration  —  and  a  confidential  re- 
monstrance on  the  part  of  a  very  sensible  man,  a  member  of 
the  Aulic  council,  respecting  the  confusion  that  might  here- 
after ensue,  should  it  come  to  be  suspected  that  the  stream  of 
reputed  legitimacy  had  been  reinforced  by  a  tributary  rill  of 
Minister  blood. 

Upon  his  reappearance  in  Ireland,  our  prodigy,  exulting  in 
the  fame  of  his  Continental  exploits,  was  about  to  commence 
a  new  course  of  wonders  in  his  native  land,  when  an  unfore- 
seen occurrence  in  the  form  a  dishonored  check  upon  his 
banker  came  to 

"repress  his  noble  rage 


And  freeze  the  genial  current  of  his  soul." 

He  discovered  that  he  was  a  ruined  man.  The  patrimonial 
ten  thousand  pounds  which  had  given  an  eclat  to  all  he  did, 
had  vanished.  The  road  to  glory  still  lay  before  him,  but  he 
was  without  a  guinea  in  his  pocket  to  pay  the  travelling  ex- 
penses. 

In  this  emergency  there  were  three  courses  open  to  him  — 
to  cut  his  throat  —  to  sell  his  soul  to  the  Protestant  ascendency 
—  or  to  be  honest  and  industrious,  and  ply  at  his  profession. 
He  chose  the  last — and  (the  most  wondrous  thing  in  his  won- 
derful career)  it  came  to  pass,  that  notwithstanding  the  many 
apparent  disqualifications  under  which  he  started,  he  rose,  and 
not  slowly,  to  an  eminence  which  no  one  but  himself  would 
have  ventured  to  predict.  He  is  now  "  quantum  mutatus  ah 
itto"  a  very  able  and  distinguished,  person  at  the  Irish  Bar, 
Mr.  Sergeant  Goold. 

If  I  have  ushered  in  my  notice  of  this  gentleman  with  an 
allusion  to  the  freaks  of  his  youth,  of  which,  after  all,  I  may 
have  received  an  exaggerated  account,  it  is  because  I  consider 
it  to  be  infinitely  to  his  praise  that  he  should  have  so  manfully 
surmounted  his  early  pretensions  and  disappointments,  as  the 
progress  of  his  professional  history  has  evinced.  The  study 
of  "  four-day  rules,"  and  "notices  to  quit,"  demands  no  extra- 
ordinarv  reach  of  intellect ;  but  the  transition  from  the  airy 


93t>  THOMAS    GOOLD. 

speculations  of  a  sanguine  and  ambitious  disposition  to  these 
unimaginative  details  is  one  the  most  abrupt  and  mortify- 
ing that  ever  tried  the  elasticity  and  patience  of  the  mental 
powers. 

Mr.  Goold,  notwithstanding  the  friskiness  and  levity  of  his 
external  deportment,  had  the  inward  energy  to  face  and  sur- 
mount the  repelling  task.  He  plunged  with  a  hardy  and 
exploring  spirit  into  the  wilderness  of  law — burst  through  its 
perplexities,  drank  freely,  and  made  no  wry  faces,  from  its 
bitter  springs ;  and  by  a  perseverance  in  patient  and  solitary 
labor,  entitled  himself  to  more  substantial  returns  than  that 
applause  which  he  had  once  prized  above  every  earthly  com- 
pensation. 

Some  time  after  Mr.  Goold  had  formed  this  meritorious  reso- 
lution, an  incident  befell  him,  of  which  it  is  difficult  to  say 
whether  it  was  most  calculated  to  quicken  or  to  damp  his  new- 
born ardor  for  laborious  occupation.  When  Burke's  celebrated 
"Reflections  on  the  French  Revolution"  appeared,  the  author 
and  the  book,  as  all  my  readers  know,  were  vigorously  assailed. 
Mr.  Goold,  considering  the  subject  not  unworthy  of  his  powers, 
had  thrown  himself  into  the  controversy.  He  was  at  the  time 
in  a  frame  of  mind  befitting  a  sturdy  partisan.  He  had  re- 
cently returned  from  Paris,  where,  during  a  residence  of  some 
time,  he  had  been  an  eyewitness  of  the  disgusting  clamor  and 
excesses  of  the  period.  He  was  also  still  smarting  from  the 
recollection  of  certain  rude  accolades  that  had  been  forcibly 
imposed  upon  himself  by  sundry  haggard  Naiads  of  the  Halle 
—  a  perversion  of  the  authentic  rights  of  men  and  of  women, 
against  which,  when  he  came  to  record  the  fact,  he  did  not  fail 
to  protest  with  genuine  antigallic  indignation.  His  pamphlet 
was  entitled,  characteristically  enough,  a  "Defence  of  Mr. 
Burke's  work  'against  all  his  opponents.'"  The  number  that 
had  already  declared  themselves  in  print  amounted  to  ten  — 
two  anonymous  ladies,  and  eight  gentlemen  —  among  whom 
were  Doctors  Towers,  Price,  and' Priestley.* 

*  Eminent  dissenters,  ultra-liberal  in  politics.  Dr.  John  Towers,  was  a  Unita- 
rian preacher,  and  wrote  several  biographical  and  political  works.  He  died 
in  1799,  aged  sixty-two. —  Dr.  Richard  Price,  celebrated  for  his  ability  *n  arith 


DEFENCE    OF   BURKE.  23? 

The  defender  of  Burke  took  each  of  them  in  detail.  The 
gentlewomen  he  despatched  with  a  good  deal  of  gallant  for- 
bearance; but  for  the  doctors  and  their  male  auxiliaries  he 
had  no  mercy.  He  belabored  them  with  unsparing  logic  and 
more  relentless  rhetoric,  until  every  sign  of  sense  and  argu- 
ment was  beaten  out  of  them,  and  proclaimed  his  victory  by  a 
final  flourish  of  trumpets  to  the  renown  of  Burke.  "I  never, 
says  he,  saw  Mr.  Burke  but  once.  I  saw  him  from  the  gallery 
of  the  House  of  Commons.  I  knoAv  no  man  that  knows  him. 
I  probably  shall  know  no  man  that  knowrs  him.  In  a  few 
weeks  I  leave  this  country,  perhaps  never  to  return.  I  expect 
but  little  from  any  man.  I  shall  never  ask  any  thing.  In 
whatever  country  I  may  live,  in  whatever  situation  I  may  be 
placed,  I  shall  look  down  on  grandeur,  I  shall  look  up  to 
greatness.  Nor  wealth,  nor  rank,  nor  power,  nor  influence, 
shall  bend  my  stubborn  neck.  I  am  prostrate  before  talents  ; 
I  am  prostrate  before  worth  ;  my  admiration  of  Mr  Burke 
amounts  almost  to  enthusiasm,"  &c. 

This  was  pretty  strong  incense,  and  there  was  more  of  the 
same  kind ;  but  I  am  quite  certain  that  it  was  offered  without 
the  remotest  expectation  of  any  return  in  either  praise  or 
profit;  and  as  to  the  writer's  professions  of  independence, 
though  very  hazardous  in  so  young  an  Irishman,  they  have 
been  amply  justified  by  his  subsequent  life.     The  pamphlet, 

metical  calculations,  was  consulted  by  William  Pitt,  as  to  the  best  mode  of 
paying  off  the  national  debt,  and  suggested  the  Sinking  Fund,  which  Alison 
thinks  would  have  affected  its  purpose,  if  strictly  adhered  to  and  persevered 
in.  When  the  French  revolution  broke  out,  Dr.  Price,  who  had  charge  of  an 
Arian  congregation,  near  London,  preached  a  sermon  "  On  the  Love  of  Coun- 
try," in  which  he  hailed  the  French  revolution  as  the  commencement  of 
a  glorious  era.  Burke,  in  his  celebrated  Reflections  on  that  event,  severely 
animadverted  on  Price  and  his  opinions.  Dr.  Price  died  in  1791,  aged  sixty- 
eight. —  Dr.  Joseph  Priestley,  a  dissenting  minister,  well  known  as  a  political 
writer  and  experimental  philosopher,  also  was  an  ardent  admirer  of  the  French 
revolution,  and  a  mob  at  Birmingham,  where  he  resided,  burned  his  house, 
library,  manuscrij  ts,  and  scientific  apparatus  and  instruments,  his  life  being  in 
imminent  danger  also.  He  retired  to  the  United  States  in  1794,  and  died  at 
Northumberland,  in  Pennsylvania,  in  1804,  aged  seventy-one.  His  published 
works  extend  to  nearly  eighty  volumes. —  M. 


238  THOMAS    GOOLD. 

however,  taken  altogether,  attracted  the  notice  and  excited 
the  gratitude  of  Burke.* 

The  fact  is  rather  curious,  as  illustrating  the  predicament  of 

*  By  the  common  consent  of  competent  Judges,  of  all  shades  of  politics, 
Burke  was  one  of  the  greatest  men  at  a  period  in  British  history,  when  emi- 
nence was  less  frequent  than  at  present.  Dr.  Johnson,  who  knew  him  well, 
said,  "  Edmund  Burke  in  discourse,  calls  forth  all  the  power's  of  my  mind  ;  were 
I  to  argue  with  him  on  my  present  state,  it  would  be  the  dealh  of  me."  Some- 
body asked  him  whether  he  did  not  think  that  Burke  resembled  Cicero,  ana 
Johnson  answered,  "No,  sir:  Cicero  resembles  Burke."  At  another  time  he 
said  that  no  person  of  sense  ever  met  Burke  under  a  gateway  to  avoid  a  show- 
er, who  did  not  go  away  convinced  that  he  was  the  first  man  in  England. — 
Fox,  after  their  quarrel,  publicly  confessed  that  all  he  had  ever  read  in  books, 
all  that  his  fancy  had  imagined,  all  that  his  reasoning  faculties  had  suggested, 
or  his  experience  had  taught  him,  fell  far  short  of  the  exalted  knowledge  which 
he  had  acquired  from  Burke. —  Grattan,  when  studying  law  in  London,  often 
heard  Burke  speak  (in  1772,  ere  he  had  reached  middle  life),  and  said  he  was 
ingenious,  oratorical,  undaunted  ;  boundless  in  knowledge,  instantaneous  in  his 
apprehensions,  abundant  in  his  language,  speaking  with  profound  attention 
and  acknowledged  superiority. —  Pitt  characterized  his  remarks  as  the  over- 
flowing of  a  mind,  the  richness  of  whose  wit  was  unchecked  for  the  time  by 
its  wisdom. —  Cazales  declared  that  Burke  possessed  the  sublimest  talents,  the 
greatest  and  rarest  virtues,  that  ever  were  enshrined  in  a  single  character.— 
Gerard  Hamilton,  when  at  variance  with  him,  protested  that  he  understood 
everything  except  gaming  and  music. —  Windham  said  that  it  was  not  among 
the  least  calamities  of  the  times  that  the  world  had  lost  him. —  Crabbe  speaks 
of  the  vastness  of  his  attainments  and  the  immensity  of  his  varied  powers. — 
Lord  Thurlow  stated  that  Burke  would  be  remembered  with  admiration  when 
Pitt  and  Fox  would  be  comparatively  forgotten. —  Goldsmith,  speaking  of  John 
son,  asked  "Does  he  wind  into  a  subject  as  Burke  does?" — Learning,  said 
another  admirer,  waits  upon  him,  like  a  handmaid,  presenting  to  his  choice  all 
that  antiquity  had  called  or  invented. —  As  a  public  speaker,  he  was  bold  and 
forcible,  his  delivery  easy  and  unembarrassed.  He  spoke  with  a  strong  Irish 
accent,  but  his  manner  was  inelegant.  He  was  an  orator,  but  not  a  debater. 
He  crowded  his  speeches  with  metaphors,  ornaments,  and  classical  allusions, 
until  the  subject-matter  was  hidden  beneath  the  illustrations.  His  eloquence 
was  too  rich  for  the  bulk  of  his  auditors,  consisting  of  plain  country-gentlemen 
—  who  sneered  at  what  they  did  not  understand.  In  a  word,  \e  astonished 
rather  than  convinced.  His  published  must  not  be  taken  as  his  spoken  speech- 
es—  for  when  they  came  to  be  printed  he  rewrote  and  corrected  them  so  much 
Jiat  the  compositors  usually  found  it  easier  to  distribute  the  type  and  reset  the 
v/hole  matter  than  to  attempt  to  alter  it  on  the  stone  or  in  the  galley !  Lat- 
terly, his  parliamentary  speeches  did  not  at  all  strike  his  hearers  —  except  for 
their  prolixity  —  they  were  spoken  essays,  and  when  he  rose  to  deliver  one  of 
them,  two  thirds  of  ihe  members  would  retire  to  take  refreshments  at  Bellamy'*. 


EDMUND    BURKF.  239 

feeling  in  which  that  eminent  person's  new  theories  and  new 
connections  had  involved  him.  He  had  just  quarrelled  with 
his  old  political  associates  for  adhering  to  the  spirit  of  the 

Hence  he  was  called  The  Dinner  Bell.  Goldsmith,  who  knew  and  loved 
him,  described  him  as  one 

"  Who,  born  for  the  universe,  narrowed  his  mind, 
And  to  party  gave  up  what  was  meant  for  mankind : 
Who,  too  deep  for  his  hearers,  still  went  on  refining, 
And  thought  of  convincing  when  they  thought  of  dining." 
General  Fitzpatrick,  speaking  of  Burke,  said,  "Ask  any  well-informed  public 
character,  who  is  the  best-informed  man  in  Parliament,  and  the  answer  will 
certainly  be,  Burke  ;  inquire  who  is  the  most  eloquent  or  the  most  witty,  and 
the  reply  will  be,  Burke  ;  then  ask  who  is  the  most  tiresome,  and  the  response 
still  will  be,  Burke  —  most  cei'tainly,  Burke."  Born  in  Ireland,  on  the  first 
day  of  1730,  Burke  went  to  England,  at  the  age  of  twenty-three,  to  study  law. 
His  family  chiefly  supported  him  in  London,  but  he  also  earned  money  by  his 
pen.  His  "  Vindication  of  Natural  Society,"  and  his  "  Treatise  on  the  Sub- 
lime and  Beautiful,"  published  in  1756,  introduced  him  into  literary  society. 
Nine  years  after,  he  became  pi-ivate  secretary  to  the  Premier  (the  Marquis  of 
Rockingham),  who  brought  him  into  Parliament.  Then  commenced  that  long 
and  brilliant  career  which  is  part  of  English  history.  His  first  effort,  as  a  pol- 
itician, was  in  favor  of  the  American  colonies,  and,  for  several  years,  he  op- 
posed the  obnoxious  measures  of  the  Government.  He  joined  Fox  in  opposing 
Lord  North's  administration,  which  they  broke  up  —  Burke  taking  office  under 
the  new  Ministry,  retiring  on  the  sudden  death  of  Lord  Rockingham,  and  i*j- 
tuming  under  the  Coalition  of  Fox  and  North.  At  the  age  of  five-and-twenty, 
Pitt  became  Premier,  and  thenceforth  Burke  was  exiled  from  office.  This 
was  in  1783,  and  Burke  continued  a  mere  opposition-member  until  1786,  when 
he  became  principal  on  the  impeachment  of  Warren  Hastings.  During  the 
insanity  of  George  III.  in  1788,  Burke  joined  Fox  in  asserting  the  claims  of 
the  Prince  of  Wales  to  a  regency  without  restrictions.  In  1789,  when  the 
French  Revolution  broke  out,  and  his  friends  hailed  it  as  the  dawn  of  freedom 
for  the  nations,  Burke,  threw  himself  headlong  into  violent  opposition,  renounced 
all  connection  with  Fox,  published  his  "  Reflections  on  the  French  Revolution," 
which  the  European  despots  had  translated  into  many  languages,  while  George 
III.  presented  copies  of  it  to  his  particular  friends,  as  "  a  book  which  every 
gentleman  ought  to  study."  The  work  was  so  elaborated  that  no  fewer  than 
ten  or  twelve  proofs  were  destroyed  before  he  could  please  his  own  fastidious 
taste.  He  continued  possessed  with  an  anti-Gallican  feeling  during  the  remain- 
ing few  years  of  his  life.  In  1795,  he  obtained  a  State-pension  of  twelve  hun- 
dred pounds  sterling  a  year,  afterward  raised  to  three  thousand  seven  hundred 
pounds  sterling,  with  the  remainder  to  his  widow,  who  survived  him  veiy  many 
years.  It  is  impossible  to  sav  whether  an  understanding  that  he  was  to  be  go 
rewarded  made  Burke  write  down  (as  far  as  he  could)  the  principles  of  lib* 
eny  which  he  had  avowed  and  defended  for  thirty  years,  but  Sir  Philip  Francis 


240  THOMAS   GOOLD. 

principles  lie  himself  Lad  taught  them.  Still  professing  the 
tenets  of  "  an  exalted  freedom,"  he  was  pouring  forth  curses 
and  derision  upon  one  of  the  most  provoked  and, necessary  acts 
of  freedom  which  the  world  had  ever  witnessed  ;  and  such  is 
the  sophistry  with  which  a  favorite  passion  can  practise  upon 
the  strongest  intellect,  he  would  fain  persuade  himself  that  he 
was  consistent  to  the  last,  and  that  doctrines  which  were  hailed 
with  joy  in  every  despotic  coterie  of  Europe,  were  the  only 
genuine  and  unadulterated  maxims  of  a  British  Whig. 

But  though  bold  even  to  overbearing  in  his  public  assertions 
of  his  personal  consistency,  it  is  not  unreasonable  to  surmise 
that,  in  his  private  hours,  his*  heart  was  ill  at  ease.  He  must 
have  felt  that  his  fame,  if  not  his  conscience,  was  in  want  of 
external  support.  Certain,  however,  it  is,  that  he  grasped  at 
the  voluntary  offer  with  something  like  the  sign  of  a  sinking 
spirit.  The  tributes  of  ardent  admiration  and  respect  so  pro- 
fusely scattered  through  his  young  countryman's  pamphlet 
touched  the  veteran's  feelings,  and  lived  in  his  memory  upon 
the  first  occasion  that  offered  of  marking  his  sense  of  the  obli- 
gation. 

The  opportunity  seemed  to  present  itself  upon  the  appoint- 
ment of  Lord  Fitzwilliam*  in  1795  to  the  government  of  Ire- 

(the  reputed  author  of  "  The  Letters  of  Junius")  used  to  say  that  if  the  friends 
of  peace  and  liberty  had  subscribed  thirty  thousand  pounds  sterling  to  relieve 
Burke's  pecuniary  embarrassments,  there  would  have  been  no  war  against  the 
French  Revolution.  Burke's  writings  vindicated  Pitt's  policy  of  war  with 
France,  to  restore .  "  legitimacy,"  and  this  war  added  six  hundred  million 
pounds  sterling  to  the  National  Debt  of  England !  Burke  died  on  July  8, 
1797,  aged  sixty-seven. —  M. 

*  The  Earl  Fitzwilliam,  nephew  of  the  Marquis  of  Rockingham  (who  was 
Prime  Minister  in  1765-'6,  and  again  in  1782),  entered  the  House  of  Commons 
early,  and  steadily  adhered  to  the  principles  of  Fox,  until  the  French  revolu- 
tion, when  he  seceded,  as  Burke  did,  and  consequently  pleased  Pitt,  who  ad- 
mitted him  into  the  Cabinet  in  1794,  and  sent  him  as  Viceroy  to  Ireland,  in 
the  following  year.  He  was  too  liberal  for  the  office  and  was  soon  recalled. 
But  he  supported  Pitt's  war  with  France.  In  1798-9,  he  was  appointed  Lord 
Lieutenant  of  the  West  Riding  of  Yorkshire,  but  was  dismissed,  in  1819,  be 
cause  he  had  attended  a  public  meeting  held  to  petition  for  an  inquiry  into 
the  conduct  of  the  Manchester  magistrates  at  what  is  called  "  The  Peterloo 
Massacre."  He  had  previously  formed  one  of  "All  the  Talents"  ministry,  ia 
1806,     His  death  took  place  in  1833,  in  Ids  seventy-fifth  year.— M. 


bueke's  gratitude.  241 

land.  One  evening  Mr.  Goold  was  sitting  alone  in  his  lodging, 
and  indulging  (if  it  can  be  called  an  indulgence)  in  those 
depressing  reflections  upon  his  future  prospects  with  which  the 
stoutest-hearted  junior  barrister  is  occasionally  visited,  when 
an  English  letter  was  put  into  his  hand.  It  was  from  Edmund 
Burke.  It  imported  that  "  he  had  not  forgotten  Mr.  G.'s  ad- 
mirable pamphlet,  and  that  he  was  most  desirous  to  advance, 
as  far  as  it  in  his  power  lay,  the  author's  fortunes.  An  occa- 
sion appeared  to  offer.  The  new  viceroy  of  Ireland  was  com- 
ing, preparatory  to  his  departure  for  that  country,  to  pass  some 
days  at  Beaconsfield ;  and  if  the  demolisher  of  the  ten  oppo- 
nents could  contrive,  without  loss  of  time,  to  cross  the  Channel, 
and  meet  his  lordship  at  Mr.  Burke's,  the  happiest  results 
might  be  anticipated."  None  but  those  who  know  the  brisk- 
ness of  Mr.  Goold's  temperature,  even  at  the  present  day,  can 
well  conceive  the  delicious  perturbation  of  spirit  that  must 
have  ensued.  The  lustre  of  the  invitation  itself — the  ex- 
pected glory  of  being  present  at  conferences  where  the  ap- 
proaching redress  of  Irish  wrongs  was  to  be  freely  canvassed 
—  the  elevating  prospect  of  being  himself  officially  selected  to 
contribute  the  aid  of  his  attainments  to  the  labors  of  a  patriotic 
administration  —  these  and  many  other  bright  concomitants  had 
just  arranged  themselves  into  a  picture  almost  too  dazzling  for 
mortal  eye,  when  one  miserable  reality  intervened  like  an 
angry  cloud,  and  the  gorgeous  imagery  faded  away  into  mel- 
ancholy dimness. 

He  was  under  a  financial  incapacity  of  complying  with  the 
generous  proposal  of  Mr.  Burke.  He  was  pondering  over  this 
mortifying  obstacle,  when  one  of  his  friends,  the  late  Sir 
Charles  Ormsby,  entered  the  room. 

"  Was  there  ever  such  an  unlucky  fellow  V*  said  he,  handing 
the  letter  to  Sir  Charles.     "  See  there,  what  an   opportunity 
of  making  my  fortune  presents  itself;   and  yet,  for  want  of 
about  a  hundred  pounds  to  go  over  and  make  a  proper  appear 
ance  at  Beaconsfield,  I  must  let  it  slip." 

Sir  Charles  was  not  in  those  days  as  rich  as  he  subsequently 
became,  but  his  father  was  a  wealthy  and  good-natured  ma]} 

Vol   L  — 11 


24.2  THOMAS    GOOLD. 

• 

"Go  to  my  father,"  said  he  —  "show  him  the  letter,  state 
your  situation,  and  I  undertake  to  say  that  he'll  accommodate 
you." 

The  experiment  succeeded.  Mr.  Gooldflew  to  Beaeonsfield  ; 
was  too  late  to  catch  the  Viceroy,  who  had  already  set  out  for 
Ireland;  passed  some  days  with  Burke;  reposted  to  Dublin, 
the  bearer  of  a  powerful  introduction  to  the  favor  of  Lord  Fitz- 
.  william  ;  was  graciously  received,  and  would  in  all  likelihood 
have  been  included  in  the  political  arrangements  then  in  prog- 
ress :  but  the  Beresfords  were  at  work  on  the  other  side  of  the 
water;*  their  fatal  counsels  prevailed;  the  patriotic  Viceroy 
was  recalled  ;  the  doom  of  Ireland  was  sealed,  and  the  subject 
of  the  present  sketch  reconsigned  to  the  hard  destiny  of  a  legal 
drudge.  Fortunately,  however,  and  honorably  for  himself,  his 
spirit  was  too  buoyant  to  sink  beneath  the  disappointment. 
He  betook  himself  with  unabated  ardor  to  his  former  pursuits. 
His  professional  acquirements  and  efficiency  became  known  ; 
clients  poured  in  upon  him  ;  in  a  few  years  he  was  invested 
with  a  silk-gown  ;  and  had  not  his  political  integrity  interfered, 
he  would,  if  current  report  be  true,  have  before  this  been  seated 
on  the  bench. 

Sergeant  Goold's  practice  has  been  and  still  is  principally 
in  the  nisi-jnius  Courts.  I  have  not  much  to  say  of  his  dis- 
tinctive qualities  as  a  lawyer.  He  is  evidently  quite  at  home 
in  all  the  points  that  come  into  daily  question,  and  he  puts 
them  forward  boldly  and  promptly.  Here,  indeed,  as  else- 
where, he  affects  a  little  too  much  of  omniscience ;  but  un- 
questionable it  is  that  he  knows  a  great  deal.  There  is  not,  I 
apprehend,  a  single  member  of  his  profession  less  liable  to  be 
taken  by  surprise  upon  any  unexpected  poirjj:  of  evidence,  or 
practice,  or  pleading,  the  three  great  departments  of  our  law 
to  which  his  attention  has  been  chiefly  directed.  But  there  is 
no  want  of  originality  in  his  appearance  and  manner.  His 
person  is  below  the  middle  size,  and,  notwithstanding  the  wear 

*  The  Beresfords,  members  of  the  Marquis  of  Waterford's  family,  took  an 
active  and  intolerant  part  in  governing  Ireland  for  forty  years  before  the  Union. 
The  cruelties  of  John  Claudius  Bercsford,  during  the  revolt  of  1798,  were  no- 
torious, enormous,  and  wanton  —  almost  beyond  credibility — M. 


HIS   VANITY.  243 

and  tear  of  sixty  years,  continues  compact,  elastic,  and  airy.* 
His  face,  though  he  sometimes  gives  a  desponding  hint  that  it 
is  not  what  it  was,  still  attests  the  credibility  of  his  German 
adventures.  The  features  are  small  and  regular,  and  keen 
without  being  angular.  His  manner  is  all  his  own.  His  quick 
blue  eye  is  in  perpetual  motion.  It  does  not  look  upon  an 
object;  it  pounces  upon  it.  So  of  the  other  external  signs  of 
character.     His  body,  like  his  mind,  moves   at  double-quick 

*  Charles  Phillips  descrihes  Goold  and  Grady  as  the  established  and  recog- 
nised gladiators  "  of  the  Irish  Court  of  Common  Pleas,  over  which  presided  the 
punning  Lord  Norbury,  with  the  glow  of  Bacchus  and  the  cheeks  of  iEoW— 
his  Lordship,  it  should  be  noted,  always  puffed,  like  an  asthmatic  locomotive, 
before  uttering  a  joke.  "  Goold  was  a  little  man,  well  formed,  and  of  consid- 
erable accomplishments.  Sensitive  and  fastidious,  he  acknowledged  but  one 
earthly  model  of  perfection,  which,  however,  he  viewed  with  Eastern  idolatry, 
and  that  was — himself!  With  the  versatility  of  a  Crichton  and  the  politeness 
of  a  Chesterfield,  all  airs  and  graces,  master  of  everything,  and  neglecting  noth- 
ing, he  was  "himself  alone"  unapproached  and  inimitable,  judice  Tom.  He 
not  only  argued,  declaimed  and  philosophized,  better  than  any  one  else,  but 
he  sang,  he  danced,  he  rode,  he  even  brushed  his  hair  so  as  to  set  rivalry  at 
defiance.  Guileless  and  harmless  vanity  !  counterpoised  by  a  thousand  sterling 
qualities.  He  was  an  excellent  Nisi-Prius  fencer,  and  even  rose  at  times  to  a 
high  order  of  eloquence.  Had  Goold  been  contented  with  the  world's  estimate 
of  him  as  he  really  was,  all  would  have  admitted  him  to  be  an  eminent  man. 
But  he  sharpened  censure  and  excited  ridicule  by  aspiring  to  be  what  no  man 
ever  was — in  every  art,  trade,,  science,  profession,  accomplishment,  and  pursuit 
under  the  sun,  a  ne  plus  ultra.  The  pitch  to  which  he  carried  this  foible  was  in- 
credible. Expatiating  one  day  on  the  risk  he  ran  from  a  sudden  rise  of  the 
tide  when  riding  on  the  North  Strand,  near  Dublin,  he  assured  his  hearer,  that 
"  had  he  not  been  the  very  best  horseman  in  existence,  he  must  have  been 
drowned ;  in  short  never  was  human  being  in  such  danger."  His  friend  re 
plied,  "  My  dear  Tom,  there  was  one  undoubtedly  in  still  greater,  for  a  poor 
man  was  drowned  there  this  morning."  "By  heaven!  sir,"  bellowed  Goold, 
"  I  might  have  been  drowned  \f  I  chose."  There  is  a  portrait  of  Goold  in  Bar 
rington's  Secret  Memoirs  of  the  Union  (taken  about  the  year  1810),  which 
shows  him  with  handsome  and  well-cut  features,  and  a  veiy  intellectual  ex 
pression.  My  own  recollection  of  Goold  dates  as  far  back  as  1827,  when  re 
went  the  Munster  Circuit.  I  saw  him  at  the  Cork  assizes.  He  was  thou  n 
whitehaired  man,  small  in  person,  neat  in  attire,  with  that  certain  elegance  of 
manner  rarely  acquired  without  familiar  mingling  in  good  society,  a  clear  com- 
plexion, and  veiy  keen  eyes.  His  voice  was  feeble,  and  his  energy  appeared 
extinct.  He  was  then  one  of  the  King's  Sergeants,  which  gave  him  prece- 
dence a:  the  bar,  and  the  lead  in  all  the  Crown  cases.  His  income  continued, 
therefore,  long  after  his  actual  ability  to  earn  it  had  declined  and  faded. —  M. 


244  THOMAS   GOOLD. 

time.  He  darts  into  court  to  argue  a  question  of  costs  with  the 
precipitation  of  a  man  rushing  to  save  a  beloved  child  from  the 
flames.  This  is  not  trick  in  him,  for  among  the  collateral  arts 
of  attracting  notice  at  the  Irish  bar  is  that  of  scouring  with 
breathless  speed  from  court  to  court,  upsetting  attorneys'  clerks, 
making  panting  apologies,  with  similar  manifestations  of  the 
counsel's  inability  to  keep  pace  with  the  importunate  calls  of 
his  multitudinous  clients. 

Sergeant  Goold  stands  too  high,  and  is,  I  am  certain,  too 
proud  to  think  of  resorting  to  these  locomotive  devices.  His 
impetuosity  is  pure  temperament.  In  the  despatch  of  business, 
more  especially  in  the  chorus-scenes,  where  half-a-dozen  learned 
throats  are  at  once  clamoring  for  precedence,  he  acquits  him- 
self with  a  physical  energy  that  puts  him  almost  upon  a  par 
in  this  respect  with  that  great  "lord  of  misrule"  O'Connell 
himself. 

He  is  to  the  full  as  restless,  confident,  and  vociferative,  but 
he  is  not  equally  indomitable  ;  and  I  have  some  doubts  whether 
with  all  his  bustle  and  vehemence,  he  ever  ascends  to  the  true 
sublime  of  tumult  which  inspires  his  learned  and  unemanci- 
pated  friend.  The  latter,  who  is  in  himself  an  ambulatory 
riot,  dashes  into  a  legal  affray  with  the  spirit  of  a  bludgeoned 
hero  of  a  fair,  determined  to  knock  down  every  friend  or  foe 
he  meets,  "  for  the  honor  of  old  Ireland."  He  has  the  secret 
glory  too  of  displaying  his  athletic  capabilities  before  an  audi- 
ence, by  many  of  whom  he  knows  that  he  is  feared  and  hated. 
Sergeant  Goold,  who  has  not  the  same  personal  incentive,  is 
more  measured  and  courtly  in  his  uproar,  and  will  often,  long 
before  his  lungs  are  spent,  as  if  his  dignity  had  taken  a  sudden 
fright,  declare  off  abruptly,  and  invoke  the  talismanic  interces- 
sion of  the  Bench. 

Let  not  the  unlearned  reader  imagine  that  I  am  affecting  a 
tone  of  idle  levity.  These  forensic  rants  are  of  daily  recur- 
rence ;  and  to  have  nerves  to  withstand  them  is  a  matter  of  no 
little  moment  to  barristers  and  clients.  It  is  within  the  sanc- 
tuaries of  justice  that  much  of  the  rough  work  of  human  con- 
cerns is  transacted;  and  the  subjects,  to  be  handled  well,  must 
J>e   roughly  handled.      The  knave  must  be  vehemently  ar 


filS   FORENSIC   ORATOR?.  245 

raigned ;  the  injured  clamorously  vindicated  ;  the  factious  and 
dishonest  witness  tortured  and  stunned  until  his  soul  surrenders 
the  hidden  truth.  The  man  who  can  do  this  is  of  value  in  his 
calling ;  but  should  his  taste  recoil  from  the  rude  collision,  he 
may  still  attain  to  legal  distinction  by  other  and  less  rugged 
paths — but  as  he  values  his  interest  and  fame,  let  him  resign 
all  hope  of  making  a  figure  in  a  nisi-prius  Court. 

Sergeant  Goold  passes  in  the  Irish  Courts  for  an  eloquent 
advocate.  In  one  sense  of  the  word  he  is  so;  for  though,  far 
from  being  a  pleasant  speaker,  and  having  manifold  defects  of 
delivery  and  action,  he  still  contrives  to  make  a  very  strong 
impression  upon  a  jury,  where  feeling  is  to  be  excited,  or  the 
understanding  forcibly  impelled  in  a  particular  direction.  His 
faults  of  manner  are  angularity,  abruptness,  and  violence.  His 
articulation  is  rapid  and  unmusical.  His  diction  has  no  equa- 
bility of  flow  —  it  bursts  out  in  irregular  spirts.  But  he  has  a 
clear  head,  much  experience  of  human  character  and  passion, 
and  infinite  reliance  upon  himself.  His  tones,  however  faulty, 
are  fervid  and  sincere.  His  sentiments,  though  often  extrava- 
gantly delivered,  are  bold  and  natural,  and  reach  the  heart. 
I  would  describe  his  ordinary  style  of  addressing  a  jury  by 
saying,  not  that  it  deeply  moves  them,  for  that  wonld  imply 
a  more  regular  and  finished  order  of  speaking,  but  that  it  "  stirs 
them  up."  In  a  word,  he  bustles  through  an  appeal  to  the 
intellect  or  passions  with  great  ability.  He  commits  many 
faults  of  taste,  but  no  essential  breach  of  skill. 

The  jury  are  often  startled  by  his  detonations,  and  often 
join  in  the  general  smile  that  follows  those  little  personal  epi- 
sodes into  which  the  learned  Sergeant  occasionally  diverges ; 
but,  after  all,  they  see  that  they  have  before  them  a  man  who 
knows  well  what  he  is  about.  They  listen  to  him  with  atten- 
tion and  respect ;  never  suspect  that  he  has  the  slightest  design 
to  puzzle  them  ;  and,  when  they  retire  to  cool  their  fancies  in 
the  jury-room,  feel  extremely  disposed  to  agree  that  the  views 
he  had  thrown  up  to  them  were  founded  in  the  justice  and 
good  sense  of  the  case. 

Mr.  Goold  sat  in  the  last  session  of  the  Irish  Parliament. 
The  occasion  of  his  presence  there  is  much   to  his  honor.     I 


£46  TifoMAS    GOOLt). 

have  not  heard  by  what  particular  influence  he  was  returned. 
It  is  sufficient  to  state  that  lie  had  already  earned  a  character 
for  talent  and  public  integrity,  which  pointed  him  out  as  a  fit 
person  to  co-operate  in  defending  the  last  pass  of  the  Irish 
Constitution  against  the  meditated  surrender  by  its  perfidious 
guardians. 

The  secret  history  of  the  Union  has  not  yet  transpired  in 
all  its  ignominious  details.  A  work  professing  to  perform  such 
an  act  of  historical  vengeance,  and  emanating  from  an  eye- 
witness, was  undertaken  about  eighteen  years  ago.  A  kind  of 
prefatory  volume,  taking  up  the  subject  at  an  ominous  distance, 
was  published  as  a  specimen.  The  continuation,  or,  more 
strictly  speaking,  the  commencement,  was  anxiously  expected. 
I  have  no  authority  for  asserting  that  there  was  any  tampering 
with  the  writer's  indignation;  but  it  may  be  mentioned  as  a 
curious  coincidence,  that  the  suspension  of  his  design  was  co- 
eval with  his  appointment  to  be  Judge  of  the  Court  of 'Admi- 
ralty in  Dublin,  over  which,  if  there  be  any  truth  in  the  old 
maxim,  "Major  e  longinquo  reverential  he  must  be  allowed  to 
have  presided  in  a  style  of  the  most  imposing  dignity.  He 
has  for  many  years  been  a  resident  of  France;  sometimes,  no 
doubt,  sojourning  in  the  Isle  of  Oleron,  where  our  sea-laws  were 
originally  compiled  and  promulgated  by  Richard  I.,  and  lat- 
terly in  the  town  of  Boulogne-sur-Mer,  where  his  marine  medi- 
tations must  be  greatly  assisted  by  the  visible  aspect  of  "  things 
flotsam,  jetsam,  and  ligan,"  to  say  nothing  of  the  cheering 
influence  of  an  occasional  wreck,  in  reminding  him  of  the 
convenience  of  judicial  functions  that  can  be  performed  by 
deputy.* 

*  Mr.  Sheil  appears  to  have  literally  stated  this  "  without  the  book."  The 
publication  to  which  he  alludes,  was  in  quarto  form,  with  several  fine  portraits 
well  engraved,  and  as  many  as  six  parts  or  livraisons  were  published,  making 
three  hundred  and  two  pages  in  all.  The  first  part  appeared  in  June,  1809 
(with  a  preface  signed  by  the  author,  who  dated  from  Merrion  Square,  Dublin), 
and  the  sixth  part  was  published  in  March,  1815.  The  actual  title  of  the  book 
is  as  follows  :  "  The  Historic  Memoirs  of  the  Legislative  Union  between  Great 
Britain  and  Ireland ;  by  Sir  Jonah  Barrington,  one  of  his  Majesty's  Council  at 
Law,  Judge  of  the  High  Court  of  Admiralty  in  Ireland,  and  Member  of  the 
late  Trish  Parliament  for  the  Cities  of  Tuam  and  Clogher."     In  point  of  fact 


SlE   JONAH    BAEEINGTON.  £4? 

Had   Sir  Jonah   Barrington   persevered  in  his   design,   he 
would  have  had  some  strange  things  to  tell  of  the  honorable 

he  was  made  Judge  two  years  before  the  appearance  of  the  first  number  of  his 
book.  There  was  an  interval  of  seventeen  years  between  Part  VI.  and  the 
conclusion.  He  stated  that  this  delay  was  caused,  not  by  himself,  as  the  book 
had  long  been  completed,  but  by  three  several  booksellers,  who  undertook  to 
publish  it,  having  become  bankrupt.  As  the  republication,  in  New  Yorkj  of 
the  clever  and  popular  "  Personal  Sketches  of  his  Own  Times,"  has  recently 
drawn  attention  to  Sir  Jonah  Barrington,  I  shall  give  his  memoir,  which  is 
not  to  be  found  in  any  Biographical  Dictionary.  The  Gentleman' s  Magazine 
(of  London)  when  it  announced  his  death,  promised  a  biography,  but  never 
gave  one. —  Sir  Jonah  Barrington,  born  in  Ireland,  in  1767,  was  called  to  the 
Irish  Bar  in  1788,  entered  Parliament  as  member  for  Tuam,  in  1790,  and 
directly  opposed  Grattan  and  Curran  —  a  proceeding  which,  in  riper  years,  he 
described  as  "  true  arrogance."  In  1793,  as  a  reward  for  his  subservience  to 
the  Government,  he  was  appointed  to  a  sinecure  in  the  Dublin  Custom-House, 
worth  one  thousand  pounds  sterling  a  year.  He  was  also  made  King's  Coun- 
sel, though  only  five  years  at  the  bar.  He  says  that,  in  1799,  Lord  Castlereagh 
promised  to  make  him  Solicitor-General,  but  afterward  refused  to  do  so,  on 
finding  that  he  was  resolved  to  oppose  the  Union.  He  stood  candidate  for 
Dublin,  in  1803,  where  he  was  popular  because  he  had  latterly  opposed  the 
hated  Lord  Clare,  and  the  first  four  persons  who  voted  for  him  were  Grattan, 
Curran,  Ponsonby,  and  Plunket;  after  a  prolonged  contest  of  fifteen  days  (the 
time  of  polling  is  now  limited  to  one)  he  lost  his  election.  He  was  made  Judge 
of  the  High  Court  of  Admiralty  in  Ireland,  and  knighted  in  1807.  He  published 
a  portion  of  his  "  Historic  Memoir  of  the  Union,"  between  1809  and  1815,  and 
went  to  France  in  the  latter  year,  being  in  Paris  during  Napoleon's  Hundred 
Days."  From  that  time,  owing  to  pecuniary  difficulties,  he  continued  to  re- 
side in  France,  discharging  the  duties  of  his  judgeship  by  deputy.  In  1827, 
he  published  the  "  Personal  Sketches  of  his  Own  Times,"  which  has  had  great 
popularity  wherever  English  books  are  read.  In  the  House  of  Commons,  in 
1830,  a  serious  charge  of  malversation  (applying  to  his  own  use  funds  belong- 
ing to  private  parties,  under  the  Admiralty  laws),  and  it  was  reported  to  the 
House  by  a  committee  of  inquiry  that  the  charge  was  proven.  On  this,  both 
Houses  of  Parliament  joined  in  an  address  to  the  Crown  to  remove  him  from 
hig  high  office  —  he  had  failed  in  an  attempt  to  disprove  the  charge  in  person 
before  the  House  of  Lords  —  and  he  was  removed  accordingly.  Shortly  after 
this,  he  published  the  remainder  of  his  suspended  Memoirs  and  Anecdotes  of 
the  Union,  and  its  details  are  the  fullest  and  most  exact  yet  made  public.  He 
died  at  Versailles,  April  8,  1834.  Barrington  was  a  witty,  shrewd,  and  com- 
panionable man.  His  personal  sketches  are  full  of  lively  incident.  Of  hia 
oral  facetice  the  following  is  a  specimen  :  Once,  amid  the  ruins  of  a  cathedral, 
somebody  asked  what  the  nave  of  the  church  was?  "The  incumbent,  to  be 
sure,"  said  Barrington.  When  the  clergyman  heard  of  it  he  observed  thtl 
'*  Sir  Jonah  had  given  a  key  (k)  to  the  question." — M. 


248  THOMAS   GOOLfr. 

gentlemen  wlio  sold  their  country.  There  was  much,  however, 
that  could  not  be  concealed.  The  measure,  smoothed  and  var- 
nished as  it  might  be  to  meet  the  public  eye,  retained  all  the 
coarse  and  disgusting  outlines  of  an  Irish  job.  It  was  proposed 
in  1799,  and  rejected. 

The  following  year,  the  proposition  was  renewed  and  car- 
ried.  In  the  interval,  wonders  had  been  done  in  the  way  of 
an  amicable  arrangement.  The  predatory  rights  of  an  Irish 
representative  were  duly  considered  and  admitted.  A  vote 
and  its  concomitant  privileges  were  not  now  to  be  estimated  at 
the  old  market-price  of  seven  years'  purchase,  but,  being  to  be 
bought  up  in  perpetuity,  a  just  and  commensurate  equivalent 
was  allowed  to  meet  the  increased  cost  of  a  majority,  all  kinds 
of  compensation  in  possession  and  reversion  were  forthcoming.* 
Peerages  were  given  down.  The  Bench  was  mortgaged.  The 
earnest  of  a  pension  was  advanced  to  soothe  the  impatience  of 
the  reversionary  placeman.  Boroughs  were  declared  to  be 
private  property,  and  so  excellent  and  certain  a  provision  for 
the  patron's  younger  children,  that  it  would  be  a  violation  of 
all  justice  to  exact  their  gratuitous  surrender.  Their  pecuniary 
value  was  ascertained,  and  the  public  faith  solemnly  pledged 
to  treat  a  customary  breach  of  the  constitution  (a  title  to  prop- 
erty of  which  Blackstone  never  dreamed)  as  one  that  by  "the 
courtesy  of  Ireland"  gave  the  prescriptive  offender  an  equita- 
ble interest  in  its  continuance.t 

*  Numerous  anecdotes  of  the  legislative  higgling  on  this  occasion  are  current 
in  Ireland  —  some  of  them  sufficiently  dramatic.  One  member,  for  example, 
tendered  his  terms.  They  were  accepted,  and  a  verbal  promise  given  that  the 
contract  should  be  faithfully  observed.  He  insisted  upon  a  written  guaranty. 
This  was  refused,  and  the  treaty  broken  off.  The  member  went  down  to  the 
house,  and  vented  a  virtuous  harangue  against  the  proposed  measure.  As  soon 
as  he  sat  down,  the  written  security  was  handed  to  him.  He  put  it  in  his 
pocket,  voted  against  his  speech,  and  was  in  due  season  appointed  to  a  lucra- 
tive office  which  he  still  enjoys,  defying  the  historian  and  laughing  at  the  no- 
tion of  posthumous  fame. 

f  By  the  Act  of  Union,  eighty-four  boroughs  were  disfranchised.  Remuner- 
ation, to  the  amount  of  fifteen  thousand  pounds  sterling  each,  was  voted  to  the 
patrons.  In  the  debate  on  the  latter  point,  one  of  Lord  Castlereagh's  argu- 
ments was  that  the  patrons  could  not  have  been  brought  to  enter  upon  "  a  cool 
examination,"  of  the  general  question,  had  not  their  fears  for  their  personal  in 


His    VOTE   AGAINST   THE   TTNION.  249 

These  are  but  a  few  specimens  of  the  means  resorted  to  in 
order  to  precipitate  a  measure  that  was  announced  in  all  the 
pomp  of  prophetic  assertion,  as  the  sure  and  only  means  of 
conferring  prosperity  and  repose  upon  the  Irish  nation :  and 
were  it  not  for  certain  counteracting  circumstances,  such  as  — 
the  nightly  incursions  of  Captain  Rock  ;  the  periodical  eclipses 
of  the  Constitution  by  the  intervention  of  the  Insurrection  Act ; 
a  pretty  general  insecurity  of  life  and  property ;  the  decay  of 
public  spirit ;  the  growth  of  faction  ;  a  weekly  list  of  insolven- 
cies, murders,  conflagrations,  and  letters  from  Sir  Harcourt 
Lees,  unprecedented  in  the  annals  of  a  happy  country — but  for 
these,  and  similar  visitations,  all  originating  in  the  comprehen- 
sive and  inscrutable  efforts  of  the  prophets  themselves  to  falsify 
their  prediction,  the  Union,  notwithstanding  the  demerits  of 
its  supporters,  might  long  since  have  ceased  to  be  a  standing 
topic  of  popular  execration. 

The  disasters  that,  in  point  of  fact,  have  followed,  were 
pretty  accurately  foreseen  by  the  men  who  opposed  this  much- 
vaunted  measure.  They  failed,  but  they  did  their  duty  fearlessly 
and  well,  and  not  one  of  them,  it  is  but  just  to  say,  in  a  spirit 
of  more  entire  self-oblivion,  and  more  earnest  sensibility  to  his 
public  duties,  than  the  person  whose  name  is  prefixed  to  the 
present  article.  His  manly  and  upright  conduct,  as  usual  in 
Ireland,  excited  deep  and  lasting  resentment.  He  was  stig- 
matized as  an  honest  Irishman,  and,  disdaining  to  atone  by 
after-compliances  for  his  original  offence,  had  to  encounter  all 
those  impediments  to  professional  advancement  which  syste- 
matically followed  so  obnoxious  a  disqualification. 

Here  I  had  intended  to  close  my  observations  upon  Sergeant 
Goold ;  but  it  occurs  to  me  that  there  remains  one  topic,  not, 
indeed,  connected  with  his  professional  life,  but  of  so  much 

terests  been  set  at  rest  by  a  certainty  of  compensation.  The  injustice  of  anni- 
hilating' provisions  in  family  settlements  resting  upon  the  security  of  boroughs 
was  also  insisted  on.  I  like  better  the  stern  logic  of  Mr.  Saurin  ;  "  There  can 
be  no  injustice  in  denying  property  to  be  acquired  by  acts  which  the  law  de- 
clares to  be  a  crime.  As  well  might  the  highwayman,  upon  a  public  road  being 
stopt  up,  exclaim  against  the  disturbance  of  his  right  to  plunder  the  passengers." 
[The  actual  sum  paid  away,  as  "compensation,"  to  the  patrons  of  Irish  bor- 
oughs, at  tbe.  Union,  was  over  one  and  a  half  million  pounds  sterling.  —  M.] 

* 


250  THOMAS   GOVtt. 

notoriety,  and  to  this  clay  so  often  canvassed,  that  a  total 
silence  upon  it  might  be  misconstrued.  I  allude  to  the  evidence 
which  he  gave  in  the  year  1818,  at  the  bar  of  the  House  of 
Commons,  upon  the  inquiry  into  the  conduct  of  Mr.  Wyndham 
Quin.*  An  imputation  was  cast  upon  his  character  at  the 
time;  and  though  stifled,  as  far  as  it  could  be,  by  the  vote  of 
an  immense  majority  of  the  House,  it  has  not  wanted  external 
support  in  that  uncharitable  spirit,  which  is  ever  ready  to  pro- 
nounce a  summary  verdict  of  conviction,  upon  no  other  founda- 
tion than  the  fact  of  a  charge  having  been  made. 

I  have  now  before  me  the  report  of  the  debates,  and  the 
minutes  of  the  evidence  in  question.  The  latter  are  so 
voluminous,  that  it  would  be  altogether  unjust  to  the  party 
concerned,  to  propose  repelling  the  accusation  by  any  analysis 
and  comments  that  could  be  condensed  into  my  present  limits. 
I  can  merely  state  the  general  conclusion,  to  which  I  have 
Come  upon  a  minute  examination  and  comparison  of  the  sev- 
eral parts  of  the  evidence  ;  and  that  is  my  full  and  unhesi- 
tating conviction,  that  Mr.  G-oold  was  as  incapable,  as  the  most 
high-minded  of  his  accusers,  of  intentionally  withholding  or 
misrepresenting  a  single  fact  which  he  was  called  upon  to  dis- 
close. He  was,  I  admit,  what  is  technically  called  "  a  bad 
witness;"  barristers  are  proverbially  so  (instead  of  an  answer 
they  give  a  speech).  Mr.  Goold,  from  his  habits  and  temper- 
ament, is  peculiarly  so.  Upon  every  matter,  great  and  small, 
he  is  hot  and  hasty  ;  and  announces  his  yiews  with  the  tone 
and  temper  of  a  partisan.  It  is  a  part  of  the  constitution  of 
his  mind,  to  have  an  undue  confidence  in  the  infallibility  of  his 
faculties  and  the  importance  of  his  personal  concerns.  All 
this  broke  out,  as  it  does  everywhere  else,  at  the  bar  of  the 
House    of  Commons :    he  could  no  more   repress  it  than   he 

*  Goold,  wheji  examined  as  a  witness  in  the  Limerick  Election  case,  an- 
swered so  vaguely,  and  confusedly,  that  his  statement  appeared  full  of  discrep- 
ancies. The  Election  Committee  reported  him  guilty  of  prevarication  — a 
serious  charge  against  a  man  of  his  standing  at  the  bar  and  in  society.  The 
result  was  that  he  was  thenceforth  passed  over  in  all  law  appointments.  Pre- 
viously, his  elevation  to  the  bench  was  considered  certain.  Goold  eventually 
became  Master  in  Chancery  (a  sort  of  legal  sinecure  in  his  case),  and  died  at 
a  very  advanced  age. —  M. 


ENDORSED   BY   GRATTAtf.         *  £51 

could  the  movement  of  Lis  arteries;  and  the  effect  upon  the 
minds  of  strangers  to  his  peculiarities  may  naturally  enough 
have  been  unfavorable :  but  when  the  question  arisen  is  a 
denial  of  a  collateral  and  unessential  matter  of  fact,  a  lapse  of 
memory,  or  a  meditated  suppression,  surely  every  one,  who 
would  not  wantonly  shake  the  stability  of  character,  should 
feel  bound  to  put  the  tenor  of  a  long  and  honorable  life  against 
a  most  improbable  supposition. 

This  was  the  view  taken  by  those  who  knew  him  best : 
among  the  rest,  by  the  late  Mr.  Grattan,  whose  friendship 
alone  formed  high  evidence  of  a  spotless  reputation.  For 
thirty  years  Mr.  Grattan  had  been  his  intimate  friend,  and 
had  seen  him  pass  through  the  ordeal  of  times  which  tried, 
as  far  as  any  earthly  process  can  try,  the  worth  and  honor  of 
a  man:  and  what  was  his  impassioned  exclamation?  "Mr. 
Goold  is  thoroughly  knoAvn  to  me.  I  would  stake  my  exist- 
ence upon  his  integrity,  as  I  would  upon  my  own.  If  he  is 
not  to  be  trusted,  I  know  not  who  is  to  be  trusted  !"  To  this 
attestation,  and  its  inference,  I  can  not  but  cordially  subscribe. 


JOHN  HENRY  NOHTH. 

I  look  upon  Mr.  North  to  be  in  several  respects  a  very- 
interesting  person.  He  is  immediately  so  by  the  great  respec- 
tability of  his  character  and  talents.  He  is  at  the  same  time 
a  subject  that  less  directly  invites  the  attention  and  speculation 
of  an  observer,  in  consequence  of  certain  predicaments  of  sit- 
uation and  feeling,  upon  which  his  lot  has  cast  him,  and  in 
discussing  which  the  mind  must,  of  necessity,  ascend  from  the 
qualities  and  the  fortunes  of  the  individual  to  considerations  of 
a  higher  and  more  lasting  concern.  If  I  were  to  treat  of  him 
solely  as  a  practising  barrister,  possessed  of  certain  legal  attri- 
butes, and  having  reached  a  determined  station,  the  task  would 
be  short  and  simple.  But  this  would  be  unjust.  Mr.  North's 
mind  and  acquirements,,  and,  it.  may  be  added,  his  personal 
history,  entitle  him  to  a  more  extended  notice,  and,  in  some 
points  of  view,  to  greater  commendation,  not  unmingled,  how- 
ever, with  occasional  regrets,  than  his  merely  forensic  career 
would  claim.  • 

It  is  now  about  fifteen  years  since  Mr.  North  was  called  to 
the  Irish  bar.*     He  was  called,  not  merely  by  the  bench  of 

*  John  Henry  North,  born  in  1789,  went  through  Trinity  College,  Dublin, 
with  brilliant  success,  obtaining  such  distinctions  there  that  no  one  for  a  century 
had  a  higher  collegiate  reputation.  In  1811,  he  was  called  to  the  bai,  and 
immediately  established  a  name  for  eloquence  and  legal  acumen.  He  was 
married  in  1818,  to  the  sister  of  John  Leslie  Foster,  afterward  a  Judge,  and  a 
near  relative  of  Lord  Oriel.  Mr.  North,  whose  character  for  oratory  was  very 
high,  was  brought  into  Parliament,  in  1824,  for  an  English  borough,  by  Can- 
nin!T;  t0  whom  he  was  known.  He  was  returned  for  an  Irish  borough  in  1831, 
and  by  no  means  equalled  the  expectations  of  his  political  friends.  In  1830, 
on  the  removal  of  Sir  Jonah  Barrington,  the  office  of  Judge  of  the  Admiralty 


HISTOEICAL    SOCIETY.  253 

legal  elders  performing  the  technical  zeremony  of  investment, 
but  by  the  unanimous  voices  of  a  host  of  admiring  friends, 
so  numerous  as  to  be  in  themselves  a  little  public,  who  fondly 
predicted  that  his  career  would  form  a  new  and  brilliant  era 
in  the  annals  of  Irish  oratory.  This  feeling  was  not  an  absurd 
and  groundless  partiality.  There  was,  in  truth,  no  previous 
instance  of  a  young  man  making  his  entry  into  the  Four 
Courts,  under  circumstances  so  imposing  and  prophetic  of  a 
high  destination.  He  had  already  earned  the  fame  of  being 
destined  to  be  famous.  In  his  college  course  he  had  outstripped 
every  competitor.  He  there  obtained  an  optime  —  an  attes- 
tation of  rare  occurrence,  and  to  be  extorted  only  by  merit  of 
the  highest  order  in  all  of  the  several  classical  and  scientific 
departments,  upon  which  the  intellect  of  the  student  is  made 
to  sustain  a  public  scrutiny  into  the  extent  of  its  powers  and 
attainments. 

The  Historical  Society  was  not  yet  suppressed.*  Mr.  North 
was  accounted  its  most  shining  ornament.  It  was  an  estab- 
lished   custom   that  each  of  its  periodical  sessions  should  be 

Court  in  Ireland  was  conferred  upon  Mr.  North,  by  the  Duke  of  Wellington. 
When  the  Reform  Bill  was  brought  forward  by  Earl  Grey's  administration,  its 
details  were  opposed  by  Mr.  North,  who  considered  it  a  revolutionary  meas- 
ure ;  Canning  whose  politics  he  held,  had  always  opposed  Parliamentary  Reform. 
Mr.  North  died  in  September,  1831,  at  the  eai'ly  age  of  forty-two. 

*  The  Historical  Society,  long  connected  with  the  University  of  Dublin,  was 
at  once  the  nurseiy  and  the  school  of  Irish  Eloquence.  There  some  of  the  great 
men  who  have  made  history,  learned  the  difficult  task  of  public  speaking,  which 
has  been  well  denned  to  be  the  art  of  thinking  on  one's  legs.  In  that  arena, 
Sheil  himself  was  schooled  in  rhetoric.  Among  the  later  orators  in  this  Soci- 
ety were  Charles  Wolfe,  author  of  the  noble  lyric,  "  Not  a  drum  was  heard," 
in  which  he  described  the  burial  of  Sir  John  Moore,  who  fell,  in  January,  1809, 
during  the  retreat  at  Corunna.  The  liberal  principles  professed  and  vindicated 
in  the  Historical  Society,  induced  the  University  authorities  first  to  discounte- 
nance it,  next  to  restrict  its  license,  then  to  drive  it  out  of  connection  with  the 
College,  and  finally  to  suppress  it.  The  Speculative  Society  of  Edinburgh,  of 
which  an  account  is  given  in  Lockhart's  "Life  of  Scott" — the  place  where 
Jeffrey,  Brougham,  and  their  compeers,  learned  to  be  eloquent  —  appears  to 
have  much  resembled  the  Historical  Society  of  Dublin.  So,  also,  to  this  hour, 
are  the  Debating  Clubs  (called  "The  Union"),  at  the  Universities  of  Oxford 
and  Cambridge,  where  Heber  and  Gladstone,  as  well  as  Macaulay  and  Bulwerf 
first  gained  distinction  among  their  fellow?. —  M^, 


254:  JOHN    HENRY    NORTH. 

closed  by  a  parting  address  from  the  chair,- reviewing  and 
commending  the  objects  of  the  institution.  The  task,  as  a 
mark  of  honor,  was  assigned  to  Mr.  North.  It  was  the  last  of 
his  academic  efforts,  and  is  still  referred  to  by  those  who  heard 
him,  as  a  rare  and  felicitous  example  of  youthful  enthusiasm 
for  eloquence  and  letters,  soaring  above  the  commonplaces  of 
panegyric,  and  dignifying  its  raptures  by  the  most  luminous 
views,  and  by  illustrations  drawn  from  the  resources  of  a  pure 
and  lofty  imagination.  It  was  pronounced  to  be  a  masterpiece, 
and  the  author  urged  to  extend  the  circle  of  his  admirers  by 
consenting  to  its  publication.  But  he  had  the  modesty  or  the 
discretion  to  refuse  ;  and  the  public  were  deprived  of  a  compo- 
sition which,  whatever  might  be  its  other  merits,  would  at  least 
have  told  as  a  glowing  satire  upon  the  miserable,  monastic 
spirit,  that  soon  after  abolished  the  Historical  Society  as  a 
perilous  innovation  upon  the  primitive  objects  of  the  royal 
foundress  of  Trinity  College.  It  is  edifying  to  add,  that  John 
Locke's  Treatise  on  Government  was  also  pronounced  to  in- 
spire doctrines  that  would  have  met  no  countenance  "  in  the 
golden  days  of  good  Queen  Bess  ;"  and  as  such,  was  expelled 
from  the  college  course. 

Mr.  North's  talents  for  public  speaking  were  further  exer- 
cised, and  with  increasing  reputation,  in  the  Academical  So- 
ciety of  London.  The  impression  that  he  made  there  attracted 
numerous  visiters.  He  had  now  to  stand  the  brunt  of  an  au- 
dience little  predisposed  to  be  fascinated  by  provincial  decla- 
mation. But  the  severest  judges  of  Irish  oratory  admitted 
that  his  was  copious,  brilliant,  and,  best  of  all,  correct.  He 
was  pronounced  by  some  to  be  fitted  for  the  highest  purposes 
of  the  senate.  It  was  even  whispered  that  a  ministerial  mem- 
ber (a  fortunate  emigrant  from  Ireland,  who  had  lately  proved 
his  capacity  for  less  delicate  commissions),  had  been  secretly 
deputed  from  Downing  street*  to  "  look  in"  at  the  academies, 

*  Downing  street  in  London  is  a  cul-de-sac  in  Parliament  street,  close  to  the 
Horse-Guards,  and  in  the  vicinity  of  the  Legislature.  The  principal  offices  of 
the  State  Administration  are  in  this  street  —  or  rather  were,  as  they  have  lat- 
terly been  much  increased,  and  their  principal  facade  (which  .las  many  archi- 
tectural beauties,  and  was  erected  by  Sir  Charles  Barry,  the  architect  of  the 
JVew  Houses  of  Parliament)  is  in  Whitehall.     The  Colonial  and  Fort  ign  Ofii- 


GROWING    CELEBRITY.  255 

and  report  upon  the  expediency  of  tendering  a  "borough  and  a 
place  to  the  youthful  orator.  But  whether  it  was  that  the 
honorable  and  learned  missionary  had  no  taste  for  a  style  of 
eloquence  above  his  own  ;  or  that  he  missed  that  native  auda- 
city which  he  could  so  well  appreciate  ;  or  that  he  had  the 
shrewdness  to  infer,  from  certain  popular  tendencies  in  the 
speaker's  cast  of  thought,  that  he  might  turn  out  not  to  be  a 
marketable  man  — the  experiment  upon  Mr.  North's  virgin 
ambition,  if  ever  meditated,  was  not  exposed  to  the  risk  of 
failure.  The  murmur,  however,  ran  that  such  a  proposal  had 
been  in  agitation.  Mr.  North's  growing  celebrity  had  all  the 
benefit  of  the  rumor  ;  and  when  he  shortly  after  appeared  in 
the  Irish  Hall,  he  was  considered  to  have  perched  upon  that 
bleak  and  arid  waste  as  upon  a  mere  place  of  passage,  whence, 
at  the  expected  season  of  transmigration,  he  was  to  wing  his 
flight  to  a  brighter  and  more  congenial  clime.  This  latter 
event,  however,  contrary  to  the  calculations  and  wishes  of  all 
who  knew  him,  was  for  years  delayed.  It  is  only  the  other 
day  that  Mr.  North  has  at  length  been  summoned  to  the 
Senate.* 

In  the  interval,  his  progress  at  the  bar,  however  flattering  it 
might  be  to  a  person  of  ordinary  pretensions,  has  not  realized 
the  auspicious  anticipations  under  which  his  coming  was  an- 
nounced. Wherever  he  has  been  tried,  he  has  proved  his 
legal  competency.  In  some  of  the  qualifications  for  profes- 
sional eminence,  and,  among  them,  those  in  which  a  proud  but 
unambitious  man  would  most  desire  to  excel  —  in  a  sound  and 
comprehensive  knowledge  of  general  principles,  and  a  facility 
of  developing  them  in  lucid  and  imposing  language,  he  need 
not  shrink  from  a  comparison  with  a  single  contemporary  rival. 

,"68  are  in  Downing  street:  the  Home  and  Council  Offices,  with  the  Board  of 
Trade,  the  Commissioners  of  Education,  Treasury,  and  Woods  and  Forests, 
are  in  Whitehall,  in  connection  with  Downing  street.  The  War  Office  and  the 
Admiralty  are  between  the  Treasury  buildings  and  Charing-Cross.  —  M. 

*  Mr.  North  first  was  returned  in  1825,  for  Milbourne  Port,  a  small  borough 
under  the  influence  of  the  Marquis  of  Anglesey,  who  was  then  in  friendly  rela- 
tions with  Canning,  under  whom  he  held  office  two  years  later.  Milbourne 
Port  (which  was  disfranchised  in  1832,  by  the  Reform  Bill)  was  represented 
in  1830 -'31,  by  Mr.  Sheil.—  M, 


256  JOHN   HENRY   NORTH. 

Iii  others,  and  especially  in  the  rarer  and  higher  art  of  kind- 
ling and  controlling  the  passions  of  an  auditory,  he  has  not 
hitherto  answered  to  the  prophetic  hopes  by  which  he  was 
"  set  like  a  man  divine  above  them  all;"  while,  in  respect  of 
that  extra-forensic  and  general  importance  which  a  person  so 
gifted  might,  it  was  imagined,  so  rapidly  attain,  he  has  been 
altogether  stationary.  When  he  first  appeared  to  public  view, 
he  lighted  upon  a  pedestal,  and  the  pedestal  and  the  statue 
remain  where  they  were.  The  question  is  often  asked  by 
others  (and  I  doubt  not  by  himself),  "  How  has  this  come  to 
pass  ?"  It  is  one  involving  matters  of  general  interest  to  all 
who  embark  in  public  life  ;  and  I  shall  endeavor,  as  I  proceed, 
to  offer  a  few  such  incidental  hints,  as,  when  collected,  may 
supply  a  satisfactory  answer. 

The  early  admirers  of  this  accomplished  young  man  were 
fully  warranted  at  the  time  in  their  praises  and  predictions. 
His  mind  was  one  of  rapid  growth,  and  put  forth  in  its  first- 
fruits  the  same  qualities,  in  both  kind  and  degree,  which  are 
the  subject  of  just  admiration  at  the  present  day.  His  intellect 
is  singularly  sound  and  clear.  For  the  acquirement  of  knowl- 
edge, it  may  be  said  to  be  nearly  perfect.  It  is  vigorous, 
cautious,  and  comprehensive.  The  power  of  attention,  that 
master-key  to  science,  is  under  his  absolute  control.  Whatever 
is  capable  of  demonstration  is  within  his  grasp.  Give  him  any 
system  to  explore,  and  no  matter  how  intricate  the  paths, 
wherever  a  discoverer  has  gone  before,  he  will  be  sure  to  fol- 
low in  his  track.  His  understanding,  in  a  word,  is  eminently 
docile ;  at  least  so  I  would  infer  from  the  early  extent  and 
rapidity  of  his  scientific  attainments,  and  from  the  habits  of 
order  and  perspicacity  with  which  he  has  mastered  the  less 
manageable  dogmas  of  our  national  jurisprudence. 

In  the  power  of  imparting  what  he  has  thus  acquired,  Mr. 
North  has  also  much  that  is  uncommon.  One  qualification  of 
a  speaker  he  possesses  in  an  extraordinary  degree.  For  ex- 
temporaneous correctness  and  copiousness  of  phrase,  I  would 
place  him  in  the  very  highest  rank.  All  that  he  utters, 
wherever  the  occasion  justifies  the  excitement  of  his  faculties, 
jnight  be  safely  printed  without  revision.     Period  after  period 


O'CONNELL    AS    A   SPEAKER.  257 

rolls  on,  stately,  measured,  and  complete.  There  is  a  paternal 
solicitude  —  perhaps  a  slight  tinge  of  aristocratic  pride,  in  his 
determination  that  the  children  of  his  fancy  should  appear 
ahroad  in  no  vulgar  garb.  He  is  not  like  O'Oonnell,  who, 
with  the  improvidence  of  his  country,  has  no  compunction  in 
flinging  a  brood  of  robust  young  thoughts  upon  the  world 
without  a  rag  to  cover  them.*     Mr.  North's  are  all  tastefully 

*  O'Connell  had  wonderful  versatility  as  a  speaker.  He  literally  acted  on 
the  advice  of  St.  Paul,  and  was  "all  things  to  all  men."  In  a  Court  of  Law,  he 
occasionally  joked  with  a  jury,  dragged  them  into  his  view  of  the  case,  by  sub- 
tile argument,  strong  declamation,  and  an  irresistibly  natural  manner.  At  a 
political  meeting,  where  he  spoke  to  the  multitude,  he  alternately  made  them 
smile  or  get  enraged,  as  he  jested  or  moved  their  feelings.  In  Parliament, 
which  he  did  not  enter  until  he  was  fifty-four  years  old,  he  was  calm,  more 
subdued,  more  careful,  more  solicitous  in  his  choice  of  words,  and  his  man- 
ner of  delivering  them.  He  made  some  lucky  hits,  too,  which  amused  the 
members.  Such  was  his  allusion  to  Mr.  Walter,  of  the  Times  newspaper,  who 
retained  his  seat  on  the  Government  side  of  the  House,  in  1835,  after  his  Tory 
friends  had  crossed  back  to  the  opposition  benches.     O'Connell  turning  to  him, 

apostrophized  him  as 

"  The  last  i-ose  of  Summer 

Left  blooming  alone, 

All  its  lovely  companions 

Are  faded  or  gone  !" 

So,  also,  when  sneering  at  the  few  adherents  who  sided  with  Lord  Stanley  (now 

Earl  of  Derby),  in  1834,  when  he  seceded  from  the  Grey  Ministiy,  he  quoted 

two  lines  from  Darwin  — 

"  Thus  down  thy  hill,  romantic  Asbourne,  glides 
The  Derby  dillg,  carrying  six  insides." 
And  his  parody  on  the  three  militia  Colonels  —  Percival,  Verner,  and  Sibthorpe. 
who  were  respectively  brazen,  intolerant,  and  hirsute : — 

"  Three  Colonels,  in  three  distant  counties  born 
Sligo,  Armagh,  and  Lincoln,  did  adorn. 
The  first  in  matchless  impudence  surpassed, 
The  next  in  bigotry  —  in  both,  the  last. 
The  force  of  Nature  could  no  farther  go  — 
To  beard  the  third,  she  sheared  the  other  two !" 
As  a  parliamentary  speaker,  independent  of  his  readiness  and  ability,  O'Con- 
nell had  immense  weight  from  his  position  as  the  "  Member  of  all  Ireland,'* 
actually  carrying  with  him  the  votes  of  nearly  one  half  the  Irish  members. 
But  Sheil,  as  an  orator,  was  listened  to  with  more  attention  and  delight.     The 
moment  his  shrill  voice  was  heard,  all  was  fixed  attention  and  eager  expecta- 
tion, f«r  every  one  knew  that  a  great  intellectual  treat  was  at  hand,--  M 


258  JOHN    HENRY   NORTH. 

and  comfortably  clad.  But  this  extraordinary  care  is  nnmark 
ed  by  any  laborious  effort.  In  the  article  of  stores  of  diction, 
his  mind  is  evidently  in  affluent  circumstances,  and  betrays  no 
lurking  apprehension  that  the  demands  upon  it  may  exceed 
his  resources.  There  are  no  ostentatious  bursts  of  unwonted 
expenditure  to  keep  up  the  reputation  of  his  solvency.  Sen- 
tence after  sentence  is  disbursed  with  the  familiar  air  of  un- 
concern which  marks  the  possessor  of  the  amplest  funds. 

With  qualifications  such  as  these,  unequivocally  manifested 
at  a  very  early  age,  and  aided  by  a  graceful  and  imposing 
manner  and  a  personal  character  which  stamped  a  credit  upon 
all  he  uttered,  and  these  natural  excellences  stimulated  by  a 
generous  ambition  to  answer  the  general  call  that  was  made 
upon  him  to  be  a  foremost  man  in  his  day,  it  was  naturally  to 
be  anticipated  that  Mr.  North  would  do  great  things;  but  his 
endowments,  however  rare,  have  been  greatly  marred,  as  to 
all  tlie  purposes  of  his  fame,  by  a  radical  defect  of  tempera- 
ment, to  the  chilling  influence  of  which  I  can  trace  the  failure 
of  the  splendid  hopes  that  attended  his  entrance  upon  public 
life.  Mr.  North  has  abundant  strength  of  intellect,  but  he  has 
not  equal  energy  of  will.  His  mind  wants  boldness  and  deter- 
mination of  character.  It  wants  that  hardihood  of  purpose 
and  contempt  of  consequences,  without  which  nothing  great  in 
thought  or  action  can  be  accomplished.  He  is  trammelled  by 
a  fastidious  taste,  and  by  a  disastrous  deference  to  every  petty 
opinion  that  may  be  pronounced  upon  him.  He  sacrifices  his 
fame  to  his  dignity.  Fame,  he  should  have  remembered,  is 
like  other  fair  ladies,  and  faint  heart  never  won  her.  Like  the 
rest,  she  must  be  warmly  and  importunately  wooed.  He 
shrinks,  however,  from  the  notion  of  committing  himself  as  her 
suitor,  except  upon  a  classical  occasion. 

I  have  been  often  asked  "if  I  considered  Mr.  North  to  be  a 
man  of  genius'?"  My  answer  has  been,  "He  would  be,  if  he 
dared."  If  it  were  possible  to  transfuse  into  his  system  a  few 
quarts  of  that  impetuous  Irish  blood  which  revels  in  O'Oon- 
nell's  veins  —  if  he  could  be  brought  to  bestir  himself  and 
burst- asunder  the  conventional  fetters  that  enchain  his  spirit, 
lie  has  many  of  the  other  qualities  that  would  entitle  him  to 


HIS    FASTIDIOUS   TASTKS.  259 

that  envied  .vppellation.  But  as  it  is,  his  powers  are  enthralled 
in  a  state  of  magnetic  suspension  between  the  conflicting  in- 
fluences of  his  ambition  and  his  apprehensions.  "With  all  the 
desire  in  the  world  to  be  an  eminent  man,  and  conscious  that 
the  elements  of  greatness  are  within  him,  one  of  its  most  neces 
sary  attributes  he  still  is  without  —  a  sentiment  of  masculine 
self-reliance,  and  along  with  it  a  calm  and  settled  disdain  for 
the  approbation  of  little  friends,  and  the  censure  of  little  ene- 
mies, and  the  murmurs  of  the  tea-table,  and  the  mock-heroic 
gravity  with  which  mediocrity  is  ever  sure  to  frown  upon  a 
style  of  language  or  conduct  above  its  comprehension.  Hence 
it  is,  that  he  has  never  yet  redeemed  the  pledges  of  his  youth. 
In  his  public  displays,  which,  from  the  same  scrupulous  taste, 
have  been  far  more  unfrequent  than  they  ought,  he  has  been 
copious,  graceful,  instructive,  and,  in  general,  almost  faultless 
to  a  fault.  But  the  lofty  spirit  of  heroic  oratory  was  wanting 
— "  there  was  no  pride  nor  passion  there."  He  is  so  afraid 
of  "  tearing  a  passion  to  tatters,"  he'll  scarcely  venture  to  touch 
it.  He  distrusts  even  light  from  heaven  for  fear  it  should  lead 
astray. 

I  am  far  from  attributing  these  deficiencies  to  any  inherent 
incapacity  of  lofty  emotions  in  Mr.  North  ;  I  should  rather  say 
that  he  has  been  in  some  sort  the  spoiled  child  of  premature 
renown.  The  applause  that  followed  his  first  attempts  taught 
him  too  soon  to  propose  himself  as  a  model  to  himself,  and  to 
shudder  at  the  danger  of  degenerating  from  that  ideal  standard. 
He  speculated  "  too  curiously"  upon  how  much  character  he 
might  lose,  without  considering  how  much  more  might  yet  be 
gained.  In  this  respect  he  arrived  too  soon  at  his  years  of 
discretion.  His  mind  seems  also  to  have  early  imbibed  an 
undue  predilection  for  the  mere  elegancies  of  life,  and  for 
external  circumstances  as  connected  with  them.  In  spite  of 
his  better  opinions  on  the  subject  of  human  rights,  I  am  not 
sure  that  his  heart  would  not  beat  as  high  and  quick  at  the 
pageantry  of  a  Coronation,  as  at  the  demolition  of  a  Bastille. 
In  matters  of  literature,  too,  I  would  almost  venture  to  say 
that  what  in  secret  delights  him  most,  is  not  the  bold,  impas- 
sioned, and  agitating,  but  the  gentle  and  diffuse ;  that  he  likes 


260  JOHN    HENEY    NORTH. 

not  the  shock  of  those  tempests  of  thought  that  purify  the 
mental  atmosphere,  chasing  away  the  collected  clouds,  and 
tearing  up  our  sturdiest  prejudices  by  the  roots,  hut  rather 
prefers  to  repose  his  spirit  in  the  midst  of  those  quiet  reveries 
where  no  favorite  opinion  is  in  danger  of  being  shaken.  In* 
stead  of  ascending  to  the  mountain-tops  with  the  hardy  specu- 
lator, he  would  rather  linger  among  the  charms  of  the  culti- 
vated plain  with  the  meek  essayist  —  where,  sauntering  along 
through  scenes  of  security  and  repose,  with  all  harsher  objects 
excluded  from  the  view,  and  nothing  around  but  sweet  sights, 
sweet  smells,  and  pleasant  noises,  becalming  every  sense,  the 
pensive  soul,  forgetting,  for  the  moment,  the  world  and  its 
ways,  is  lulled  to  rest,  and  dreams  that  all  is  right. 

Mr.  North  would  have  written  the  most  beautiful  letters  in 
the  world  from  the  Lake  of  Geneva,  and  not  the  less  so  from 
the  inspiring  influence  of  an  elegant  residence  on  its  banks. 
His  speeches  savor  of  the  particular  tastes  I  have  been  descri- 
bing. There  is  too  much  of  the  equanimity  of  literature  about 
them  —  too  little  of  the  ardor  and  impetuosity  of  passion 
speaking  viva  voce.  They  rather  resemble  high-wrought  aca- 
demic effusions,  stately,  orderly,  and  chaste,  and  having  also 
the  coldness  of  chastity,  than  the  glowing  eruptions  of  a  mind 
on  fire,  warming  and  illuminating  whatever  comes  within  its 
range.  To  conclude,  Mr.  North  is  a  proficient  in  the  formal 
parts  of  the  higher  order  of  oratory  —  in  diction  —  arrange- 
ment—  the  selection  and  command  of  topics  —  delivery  —  ac- 
tion—  but  (to  adopt  some  hackneyed  illustrations)  in  the  same 
degree  as  moonlight  differs  from  the  splendor  of  the  sun,  pearl 
from  diamond,  silver  from  gold,  the  scented  and  well-trimmed 
shrubbery  from  the  majestic  forest,  the  placid  waters  of  the 
lake  from  the  impetuous  heavings  of  "  old  ocean,"  so  may 
he  be  said  to  fall  short  of  first-rate  excellence  in  the  art  of 
speaking. 

From  my  observations  upon  Mr.  North's  mind,  neutralized 
as  he  has  permitted  it  to  become,  I  should  say  that  now  his 
chief  strength  lies  in  sarcasm,  and  in  that  species  of  humor 
which  consists  of  felicitous  combinations  of  mock  heroic  im- 
agery and   gorgeous  diction,   descriptive  of  the   feelings  and 


IN   PARLIAMENT.  ■     261 

situation  of  the  object  ridiculed;  —  and  yet  lie  lias  employed 
his  powers  in  this  respect  so  sparingly,  that  I  have  some 
doubts  whether  he  be  fully  aware  of  their  extent.  I  have  not 
heard  that  he  gave  any  early  indications  of  this  talent;  and 
though  at  first  view  it  may  appear  to  be  at  variance  with  the 
leading  propensities  of  his  mind,  I  do  not  conceive  it  difficult 
to  account  for  its  existence.  On  the  contrary,  it  seems  natural 
enough  that  a  person  gifted  with  powers  of  language  and  ima- 
gination, but  of  too  timid  a  taste  to  risk  them  upon  sincere  and 
serious  trains  of  sentiment,  should  resort  to  ridicule,  and  to 
that  particular  kind,  to  which  I  have  just  adverted.  Such  a 
person  feels  what  an  awful  thing  it  is  to  be  accountable  to  a 
sneering  public,  for  the  appropriateness  of  every  generous 
thought  and  glowing  illustration  into  which  a  well-meaning 
but  too  fervid  enthusiasm  may  betray  him.  The  incessant 
recollection  of  the  proximity  of  the  ludicrous  to  the  sublime, 
appals  and  paralyzes  him ;  but  give  him  an  adversary  whose 
motives  and  reasonings  and  language  are  to  be  travestied,  and 
the  spell  that  bound  his  faculties  is  dissolved.  Here,  where 
every  exaggeration  has  a  charm,  he  ventures  to  give  full  scope 
to  his  fancy.  The  very  temper  of  mind  that  renders  him  sen- 
sitive and  wary  when  he  speaks  in  his  own  person,  suggests 
the  boldest  images,  and  the  more  grotesque  they  are  the  bet- 
ter, Avhen  by  a  rhetorical  contrivance  the  whole  responsibility 
of  them  is,  as  it  were,  shifted  upon  the  shoulders  of  another. 
I  would  almost  venture  to  predict,  that  it  is  this  way  Mr.  North 
will  make  himself  most  felt  in  the  House  of  Commons.*  He 
has  the  classic  authority  of  Mr.  Canning,  for  proposing  as  a 
subject  the  Duigenan  redivivus  of  the  House;  but  I  have  my 
fears  that  he  will  select  a  nobler  mark  than  Master  Ellis.t     I 

*  The  expectations  of  Mr.  North's  friends  were  by  no  means  realized.  He 
did  not  cut  a  figure  in  Parliament,  and  is  said  to  have  severely  and  painfully 
been  aware  of  the  fact. —  M. 

'  t  A  gentleman  named  Ellis,  who  held  the  office  of  Master  in  Chancery,  and, 
from  his  office,  was  called  "  Master  Ellis,"  had  been  elected  member  for  Dub- 
lin, some  short  time  previous  to  the  publication  of  this  sketch,  and  considerable 
dissatisfaction  was  excited  thereby,  as  it  was  considered  next  to  impossible 
that  he  could  attend  to  his  Parliamentary  duties  in  London  and  his  legal  duties 
in  Dublin,  at  one  and  the  same  time.     An  act  was  subsequently  passed  extend- 


262    •  JOHN    HENRY   NORTH. 

therefore  caution  my  Opposition  friends,  and  especially  Mr. 
Hume,  to  be  on  their  guard. 

Mr.  North's  exterior  has  nothing  very  striking;  his  frame 
is  of  the  middle  size  and  slender,  his  features  small  and  pallid, 
and  unmarked  by  any  prominent  expression,  save  those  ha- 
bitual signs  of  exhaustion,  from  which  so  feAv  of  the  occupied 
members  of  his  profession  are  exempt.  If  he  were  a  stranger 
to  me,  I  should  pass  him  by  without  observation,  but,  knowing 
who  he  is,  and  feeling  what  he  might  be,  I  find  his  face  to  be 
far  from  a  blank.  Upon  examination,  it  presents  an  aspect 
of  still  and  steady  thoughtfulness,  with  that  peculiar  curve 
about  the  lips  when  he  smiles  (as  he  often  does)  which  imports 
a  refined  but  too  fastidious  taste.  When  the  countenance  is 
in  repose,  I  fancy  that  I  can  also  catch  there  a  trace  of  lan- 
guor, such  as  succeeds  a  course  of  struggles  where  high  and 
early  hopes  had  been  embarked,  while  a  tinge  of  melancholy, 
so  slight  as  to  be  dispersed  by  the  feeblest  gleam,  but  still  re- 
turning and  settling  there,  tells  me  that  some  and  the  most 
cherished  of  them  have  been  disappointed.  I  confess  that  I 
respect  Mr.  North  too  much  to  regret  those  indications  of  a 
secret  dissatisfaction  with  his  condition  ;  and  more  especially, 
because  in  him  they  are  entirely  free  from  the  ordinary  fret- 
fulness  and  acrimony  of  mortified  ambition.  He  is  too  consid- 
erate and  just  to  wage  a  splenetic  warfare  with  the  world  be- 
cause all  the  bright  visions  of  his  youth  have  not  been  realized  ; 
and  he  is  still  too  young  and  too  cautious  of  his  capacity  to  be 
irretrievably  depressed  when  reminded  by  others  or  by  himself, 
tli at  hitherto  Fame  has  only  spoken  of  him  in  whispers,  and 
that  much  must  be  done  in  both  intellect  and  action,  before 
the  glorious  clang  of  her  trumpet  shall  rejoice  his  ear. 

These  allusions  to  Mr.  North's  omissions  as  a  public  man, 
are  offered  in  no  unfriendly  spirit.  If  I  looked  upon  him  as  an 
ordinary  person,  I  should  say  at  once  of  him,  that  he  has  well 

ing  to  Irish  Masters  in  Chancery  the  prohibition  of  sitting  in  Parliament  imposed 
upon  persons  of  like  rank  in  England.  Mr.  Ellis  was  recommended  to  the 
Church  and  State  corporation  of  Dublin,  solely  by  his  illiberal  opinions  and  in- 
tolerant principles.  He  was  a  bigot  in  politics  as  well  as  in  religion  —  servitor 
worthy  of  such  masters  as  formed  the  Dublin  Corporation  thirty  years  ago. —  M 


tTKt*ARDONABLE    NFXTEALITT.  263 

fulfilled  the  task  assigned  him.  He  lias  won  Lis  way  to  a  re- 
spectable station  in  a  most  precarious  profession  ;  enjoys  con- 
siderable estimation  for  general  talent,  and  is  cordially  honor- 
ed by  all  who  know  him,  for  the  undeviating  dignity  and  purity 
of  his  private  life.  But  from  those  to  whom  much  is  given 
much  is  exacted.  My  quarrel  with  Mr.  North  is,  that  living 
under  a  system  teeming  with  abuses,  and  loudly  calling  upon 
a  man  of  his  character  and  abilities  to  interpose  their  influence 
he  should  have  consented  to  keep  aloof  a  neutral  and  acquies- 
cent spectator.  For  fifteen  long  years,  a  liberal  and  enlight- 
ened Irishman,  seeing  with  his  own  eyes  what  an  Englisi 
barber  could  not  read  of  without  contempt  for  the  nation  thai 
endured,  and  not  to  have  left  a  single  document  of  his  indig- 
nation ! —  not  a  speech,  not  a  pamphlet,  not  an  article  in  a 
periodical  publication  —  not  even  that  forlorn  hope  of  a  mal- 
treated cause,  a  well-penned  protesting  resolution  !  What 
availed  it  to  his  country  that  he  was  known  to  be  a  friend  of 
toleration,  if  his  co-operation  was  withheld  upon  every  occa- 
sion where  his  presence  would  have  inspired  confidence,  and 
his  example  have  acted  as  a  salutary  incitement  to  others  1 
What,  that  his  theories  upon  the  question  of  free  discussion 
were  understood  to  be  manly  and  just,  if,  after  having  witness- 
ed the  irruption  of  an  armed  soldiery  into  a  legal  meeting,  and 
being  himself  among  the  dispersed  at  the  point  of  the  bayonet, 
he  had  the  morbid  patience  to  be  silent  under  the  affront  to 
the  laws,  paying  such  homage  to  the  times  as  scarcely  to 

"  Hint  his  abhorrence  in  a  languid  sneer." 

His  learning,  too,  his  literary  and  philosophic  stores,  things  so 
much  wanted  in  Ireland  —  where  has  he  left  a  vestige  of  their 
existence,  so  as  to  justify  the  most  flattering  of  his  friends  in 
saying  to  him,  "You  have  not  lived  in  vain,  and  should  you 
unfortunately  be  removed  before  your  time,  your  country  will 
miss  you  ?" 

This  is  what  I  complain  of  and  deplore;  and  these  senti- 
ments are  strong  in  proportion  to  my  estimate  of  his  latent 
value,  and  my  genuine  concern  for  the  interests  of  li is  fame; 
for,  in  the  midst  of  my  reproaches,  I  see  so  much  to  admire  and 


264:  JOHN   HENRST   NORTH. 

respect  in  him,  lie  is  of  so  meek  a  carriage,  and  has  about  him 
so  much  of  the  gentleman  and  the  scholar,  that  I  can  not  divest 
myself  of  a  certain  feeling  of  almost  individual  regard.     Nor, 
in  putting  the  matter  thus,  am  I  aware  that  I  make  any  unrea- 
sonable exactions.     At  particular  seasons,  his  profession,  no 
doubt,  must  demand  his  undivided  care  :  but  there  are  intervals 
which,  with  a  mind  full  as  Mr.  North's  is,  might  have  been,  and 
•may  still  be,  dedicated  to  honorable  uses.     There  are  not  want- 
ing contemporary  precedents  to  show  what  the  incidental  la- 
bors of  a  lawyer  may  accomplish,  in  science,  in  letters,  in  public 
spirit.     Let  him  look  to  Mr.  Brougham,  to  the  versatility  of  his 
pursuits,  and  the  varieties  of  his  fame  —  the  Courts,  the  House 
of  Commons,  and  the  "  Edinburgh  Review ;"  to  Denman,  Wil- 
liams, and  many  others  of  the  English  bar,  eminent  or  on  the 
road  to  eminence  in  their  profession,  and  patriotic  and  instruc- 
tive in  their  leisure  ;*  or  (a  more  pregnant  instance  still),  let 
him  turn  to  the  Scotch,  those  hardy  and  indefatigable  workers 
for  their  own  and  their  country's  renown.     There  is  Jeffrey, 
Cockburn,  Cranstoun,  Murray,  Montcrief,  great  advocates   ev- 
ery man  of  them  :  the  first  the  creator  and  responsible  sustainer 
of  the  noblest  critical  publication  of  the  age ;  the  others  ardent 
and  important  helpmates,  and  all  of  them  finding  it  practicable, 
amid  their  regular  and  collateral  pursuits,  to  take  an  active 
lead  in  the  popular  assemblies  of  the  north.f     These  men,  whom 
energy  and  ambition  have  made  what  they  are,  may  be  used 
in  other  respects  as  a  great  example.     Under  circumstances 
peculiarly  adverse  to  all  who  disdained  to  stoop,  they  never 
struck  to  the  opinions  of  the  day,  but,  confiding  in  themselves, 
were  as  stern  and  uncompromising  in  their  conduct  as  in  their 
maxims — yet  are  they  all  prosperous  and  respected,  and  for- 

*  The  principal  counsel  in  defence  of  Queen  Caroline  (wife  of  George  IV.), 
proceeded  against  by  a  Bill  of  Pains  and  Penalties  in  1820,  were  Henry 
Brougham,  her  Attorney-General ;  Thomas  Denman,  her  Solicitor-General ; 
Stephen  Lushington,  and  John  Williams.  The  first  became  Lord  Brougham, 
and  Lord  Chancellor  of  England ;  the  second,  Lord  Denman,  Chief  Justice  of 
the  King's  Bench ;  the  third,  Judge  of  the  Consistory  and  Admiralty  Courtt 
(which  he  still  is) ;  and  the  last  (now  dead)  one  of  the  puisne  Judges.— M. 

t  All  of  these  eminent  lawyers  subsequently  became  Judges  in  Scotland— of 
Lords  of  Session,  as  they  are  called. —  M. 


THE   SAtRtN   DYNASTY.  265 

midable  to  all  by  whom  a  high-spirited  man  would  desire  to 
be  feared. 

I  see  but  one  plausible  excuse  for  the  course  of  political  qui- 
etude to  which  Mr.  North  so  perseveringly  adhered,  and  in 
fairness  I  should  not  suppress  it.  It  was  his  fate  to  have  com- 
menced his  career  under  the  Saurin  dynasty.  Things  are 
something  better  now ;  but,  some  twelve  or  fifteen  years  ago, 
wo  betided  the  patriotic  wight  of  the  dominant  creed  who 
should  venture  to  whisper  to  the  public  that  all  was  not  un- 
questionable wisdom  and  justice  in  the  ways  of  that  potent  and 
inscrutable  gentleman  !  The  opposition  of  a  Catholic  was  far 
less  resented.  The  latter  was  a  condemned  spirit,  shorn  of  all 
effective  strength,  and  was  suffered  to  flounder  away  impotent 
and  unheeded  in  the  penal  abyss;  but  for  a  Protestant,  and, 
more  than  all,  a  Protestant  barrister,  to  question  the  infinite 
perfection  of  the  Attorney-General's  dispensations,  was  mon- 
strous, blasphemous,  and  punishable  —  and  punished  the  cul- 
prit was.  All  the  loyal  powers  of  the  land  sprang  with  in- 
stinctive co-operation  to  avenge  the  outrage  upon  their  chief 
and  themselves.  The  loyal  gates  of  the  Castle  were  slapped 
in  his  face.  The  loyal  club  to  which  he  claimed  admission, 
buried  his  pretensions  under  a  shower  of  black-beans.  The 
loyal  attorney  .'suspected  his  competency,  and  withheld  his  con- 
fidence. The  loyal  discounter  declined  to  respect  his  name 
upon  a  bill.  The  loyal  friend,  as  he  passed  him  in  the  streets, 
exchanged  the  old,  familiar,  cordial  greeting,  for  a  penal  nod. 
In  every  quarter,  in  every  way,  it  was  practically  impressed 
upon  him  that  Irish  virtue  must  be  its  own  reward.  Even  the 
women,  those  soothers  of  the  cares  of  life,  whose  approbation 
an  eminent  French  philosopher  has  classed  among  the  most 
powerful  incentives  to  heroical  exertion  —  even  they,  merging 
the  charities  of  their  sex  in  their  higher  duties  to  the  state,  vol- 
unteered their  services  as  avenging  angels.  The  teapot  trem- 
bled in  the  hand  of  the  loyal  matron  as  she  poured  forth  its 
contents,  and  along  with  it  her  superfine  abhorrence  of  the 
low-lived  incendiary  ;  while  the  fair  daughters  of  ascendency 
grouped  around,  admitted  his  delinquency  with  a  responsive 
shudder,  and  vowed  in  their  pretty  souls  to  make  his  eharac* 

Vol.  I. — 15>  .     , 


JOHN    HENRY   NORTH. 

ter,  whenever  it  should  come  across  them,  feel  the  bitter  conse- 
quences of  his  political  aberrations.  All  this  was  formidable 
enough  to  common  men.  Mr.  North  was  strong  enough  to  have 
faced  and  vanquished  it.  Instead  of  fearing  to  provoke  tho 
persecuting  spirit  of  the  times,  he  might  have  securely  Avel- 
comed  it  as  the  most  unerring  evidence  of  his  importance. 

Having  said  so  much,  I  am  bound  to  add  that  the  foregoing 
observations  have  not  the  remotest  reference  to  Mr.  North's 
conduct  at  the  bar.  There  he  is  entitled  to  the  highest  praise, 
and  I  give  it  heartily,  for  his  erect  and  honorable  deportment 
in  the  jmblic  and  (an  "equal  test  of  an  elevated  spirit)  in  the 
private  details  of  his  profession.  The  most  conspicuous  occa- 
sion upon  which  he  has  yet  appeared  was  on  the  trial  of  the 
political  rioters  at  the  Dublin  theatre.*  It  was  altogether  a 
singular  scene  —  presenting  a  fantastic  medley  of  combinations 
and  contradictions,  such  as  nothing  but  the  shuffling  of  Irish 
events  could  bring  together:  a  band  of  inveterate  loyalists 
brought  to  the  bar  of  justice  for  a  public  outrage  upon  the  per- 
son of  the  King's  representative;  an  Attorney-General  prose- 
cuting on  behalf  of  one  part  of  the  state,  and  the  other  exulting 
with  all  their  souls  at  the  prospect  of  his  failure ;  a  popular 
Irish  bench  ;  an  acquitting-  Irish  jury  ;  and,  finally,  the  profes- 
sional confidant  of  the  Orange  Lodges  —  the  chosen  defender 
of  their  acts  and  doctrines,  Mr.  North.  It  would  be  difficult 
to  conceive  a  more  perplexing  office.  He  discharged  it,  how- 
ever, with  great  talent  and  (what  I  apprehend  was  less  ex- 
pected) consummate  boldness.  As  a  production  of  eloquence, 
his  address  to  the  jury  contained  no  specimens  of  first-rate  ex- 

*  When  the  Marquis  Wellesley  was  made  Viceroy  of  Ireland,  in  1821,  the 
liberality  of  his  opinions  and  his  known  desire  that  the  Roman  Catholic  disa- 
bilities should  be  removed  rendered  him  obnoxious  to  the  "  Protestant  Ascen- 
dency" or  Corporation  and  Orange  party.  Some  ruffians  belonging  to  this 
party  threw  a  bottle  at  Lord  Wellesley,  in  Dublin  theatre,  and  bills  of  indict- 
ment were  preferred  against  certain  persons  apprehended  on  a  charge  of  com- 
plicity in  this  affair.  The  Grand  Jury  (also  Orange)  ignored  the  bills.  The' 
Government  lawyer  then  proceeded  ex-officio  —  a  course  wholly  independent 
of  grand  juries  —  but  got  frightened,  as  the  trial  approached,  and  the  charge 
fell  to  the  ground,  thereby  giving  a  great  triumph  to  the  Corporation  and  their 
satellites. —  M. 


titS    CAPABILITIES. 


set 


cellence,  but  many  that  were  not  far  below  it ;  while  his  gen 
eral  line  of  argument,  and  his  manner  of  conducting  it,  gave 
signs  of  a  spirit  and  power  from  which  I  would  infer,  that, 
should  State  Trials  unfortunately  become  frequent  in  Ireland 
during  his  continuance  at  the  bar,  he  is  destined  to  make  no 
inconsiderable  figure  as  a  leading  counsel  for  the  defences. 
The  Williamites  were  grateful  for  the  effort,  and  greeted  their 
successful  advocate  with  enthusiastic  cheers  on  his  exit  from 
the  Court.  This  was,  I  believe,  the  only  public  homage  of  the 
kind  that  Mr.  North  had  ever  received  ;  and,  however  welcome 
at  the  moment,  could  scarcely  fail  to  be  followed  by  a  senti- 
ment of  sadness,  when  he  reflected  upon  the  untowardness  of 
the  fate  which  doomed  his  name  to  be  for  the  first  time  exalted 
to  the  skies  on  the  yell  of  a  malignant  faction  that  he  must 
have  detested  and  despised. 

The  preceding  views  of  Mr.  North's  intellectual  characteris- 
tics were  formed,  and  in  substance  committed  to  paper,  before 
his  recent  appearance  in  the  House  of  Commons.*  Since  tbat 
event  I  have  seen  nothing  calling  on  me  to  retract  or  qualify 
my  first  impressions.  If  the  effect  which  he  produced  then 
was  not  all  that  had  been  expected,  I  attribute  it  far  less  to 
any  deficiency  of  general  power,  than  to  that  want  of  energy 
and  directness  of  purpose,  which  is  the  besetting  infirmity  of 
his  mind.  Let  him  but  emancipate  himself  (and  he  has  shown 
that  he  can  do  so)  from  the  petty  drags  that  have  heretofore 
impeded  his  course,  and  he  may  yet  become  distinguished  to 
his  heart's  content,  and,  what  is  better,  eminently  useful  to  his 
country.  He  has  the  means,  and  nothing  can  be  more  propi- 
tious than  the  period.  Irish  questions  press  upon  the  Parlia- 
ment; upon  the  most  vital  of  them  (the  Catholic)  he  thinks 
with  the  just,  and  will  not  fail  to  make  a  stand.  Upon  the  oth- 
ers he  can  be,  what  is  most  wanting  in  that  House,  a  fearless 
witness.  Wherever  he  interposes,  the  purity  of  his  personal 
character  —  his  position  with  the  Government  —  even  the  neu- 
trality of  his  former  course,  will  give  him  weight  and  credit. 
Nor  (as  far  as  his  ambition  is  concerned)  will  services  thus 
rendered  be  unrewarded.     So  prostrate  is  the  pride  of  Ireland. 

*  This  sketch  appeared  in'November,  1854. —  M. 


268  JOHN   HENRY   NORTH. 

that  she  no  longei  exacts  from  her  public  men  a  haughty  vin- 
dication of  her  rights.  In  these  times  a  temperate  mediator  is 
hailed  as  a  patriot.  This  Mr.  North  can  be ;  but  to  be  so  with 
effect,  he  must  distinguish  better  than  he  has  yet  done  between 
false  complaisance  and  a  manly  moderation.  He  must  give 
way  to  no  mistaken  feelings  of  political  charity  toward  a  gen- 
eration of  sinners,  whom  flattery  will  never  bring  to  repent- 
ance. If  he  praise  the  country-gentlemen  of  Ireland  again, 
until  they  do  something  to  deserve  it,  I  shall  be  seriously 
alarmed  for  his  renown. 


THOMAS   WALLACE. 

Mr.  Wallace  is  in  several  respects  a  remarkable  man. 
has  for  many  years  held  an  eminent  station  in  his  profession, 
and  is  pre-eminently  entitled  to  the  self-gratulation  of  reflect- 
ing, that  his  success  has  been  of  that  honorable  kind  in  which 
neither  accident  nor  patronage  had  any  share.  Of  his  early 
life  and  original  prospects  I  have  heard  little,  beside  the  fact 
that,  in  his  youth,  he  found  himself  alone  in  the  world,  without 
competence  or  connections,  and  with  merely  the  rudiments  of 
general  knowledge;  and  that  under  these  disheartening,  cir- 
cumstances, instead  of  acquiescing  in  the  obscurity  to  which 
he  was  apparently  doomed,  he  formed,  and  for  years  persevered 
in  a  solitary  plan  of  self-instruction,  until,  feeling  his  courage 
and  ambition  increased  by  the  result  of  the  experiments  he 
had  made  upon  himself,  and  measuring  his  strength  with  the 
difficulties  to  be  encountered,  he  rejected  the  temporary 
allurements  of  anymore  ignoble  calling  ;  and,  with  a  boldness 
and  self-reliance  which  the  event  has  justified,  decided  npon 
the  Bar  as  the  most  suited  to  his  pretensions. 

With  this  view,  and  with  a  patient  determination  of  purpose 
which  is  among  the  most  trying  exercises  of  practical  philos- 
ophy, he  qualified  himself  for  Trinity  College,  and  entering 
there,  gave  himself  (what  was  probably  his  chief  motive  in 
submitting  to  the  delay)  the  reputation  of  having  received  a 
regular  and  learned  education.  He  was  called  to  the  Bar  in 
1798,  where  his  talents  soon  bringing  him  into  notice,  he  ad- 
vanced at  a  gradual  and  steady  pace  to  competence,  then  on  to 
affluence,  and  finally  to  the  conspicuous  place  which  he  now 
fills   in   the   Irish  courts.      He  obtained   a  silk   gown  about 


270  THOMAS    WALLACE. 

seven  years  ago*  —  a  period  beyond  which  it  could  not,  with 
out  consummate  injustice,  have  been  withheld  ;  but  he  was 
known  to  have  connected  himself,  in  his  political  sympathies, 
with  Mr.  Grattan  and  the  friends  of  Ireland;!  and  this,  ac- 
cording to  the  maxims  by  which  the  country  was  then  govern- 
ed, was  an  unanswerable  reason  for  procrastinating  to  the 
latest  moment  his  title  to  precedency. 

Mr.  Wallace's  intellectual  qualities  are  in  many  particulars 
such  as  might  be  inferred  from  his  history.  In  his  character, 
as  developed  by  his  early  life,  we  find  none  of  the- peculiarities 
of  his  country — no  mercurial  vivacity  —  no  movements  of  an 
impatient  and  irregular  ambition  —  but  rather  the  composed 
and  dogged  ardor  of  a  Scotchman,  intent  upon  his  distant  ob- 
ject of  fame  and  profit,  and  submitting,  without  a  murmur,  to 
the  fatigues  and  delays  through  which  it  must  be  approached. 
In  the  same  way  it  may  be  said  of  his  mind,  that  it  has  little 

*  In  1819— this  sketch  appeared  in  July,  1826.— M. 

t  Grattan  was,  par  excellence,  the  most  liberal  man  in  Ireland  —  devoting 
over  forty  years  of  his  public  life  to  the  cause  of  national  independence  and  the 
advancement  of  civil  and  religious  liberty.  He  was  not  always  popular,  though 
Ireland  gave  him  fifty  thousand  pounds  steiding  for  his  services  in  1782.  Flood 
insinuated  that  he  had  betrayed  his  country  for  gold,  and  was  "  a  mendicant 
patriot  who,  for  prompt  payment,  had  sold  himself  to  the  Minister."  Lord 
Clare  denounced  him  as  "  an  infernal  democrat."  The  Corporation  of  Cork 
voted  that  the  street,  which  had  been  named  Grattan  street,  should  in  future , 
be  called  Duncan  street.  The  Dublin  Corporation,  who  had  graced  their  hall 
with  his  poitrait,  tore  it  down  from  the  wall,  and  received  a  motion  that  he  be 
expelled  from  their  body.  Out  of  this  an  incident  arose :  There  was  a  parlia- 
mentary contest  for  Dublin,  in  1803,  and  Sir  Jonah  Barrington  was  a  popular 
candidate.  Grattan  went  up  to  vote  for  him,  and  was  objected  to  as  one  who 
bad  been  expelled  the  corporation.  A  violent  Ascendency  man,  named  John 
Gifford  (whose  son,  Doctor  Gifford,  is  the  able  Editor  of  the  London  Standard), 
made  the  objection.  When  silence  was  restored,  Grattan  thus  denounced  him: 
"  Mr.  Sheriff,  when  I  observe  the  quarter  whence  the  objection  comes,  I  am 
not  surprised  at  its  being  made.  It  pi-oceeds  from  the  hired  traducer  of  his 
country  —  the  excommunicated  of  his  fellow-citizens  —  the  regal  rebel  —  the 
unpunished  ruffian  —  the  bigoted  agitator!  In  the  city,  a  firebrand  —  in  the 
court,  a  liar  —  in  the  streets,  a  bully  —  in  the  field,  a  coward!  So  obnoxious 
is  he  to  the  very  party  he  wishes  to  espouse,  that  he  is  only  supportable  by 
doing  those  dirty  acts  the  less  vile  refuse  to  execute." — This  was  a  pretty 
strong  use  of  the  vernacular.  When  the  roll  of  voters  was  examined,  it  showed 
that  Grattan's  name  was  never  erased,  so  he  voted  fDrhis  friend. —  M. 


HIS   PERSONAL   APPEARANCE.  271 

or  nothing  that  is  strictly  national.  The  forms  in  which  it 
excels  are  purely  abstract,  and  would  come  as  appropriately 
from  a  native  of  any  other  country.  It  is  as  an  advocate  (as 
contradistinguished  from  a  mere  lawyer),  that  he  has  been 
most  successful ;  and  here  the  characteristic  quality  of  his  style 
and  manner,  or  rather,  the  compound  result  of  all  the  qualities 
that  belong  to  him  professionally  and  individually,  is  masculine 
energy.  He  is  emphatically  "  the  strong  man."  There  is 
at  all  times,  and  on  all  occasions,  an  innate,  constitutional, 
imposing  vigor,  in  his  topics,  language,  tones,  and  gestures  ; 
all  co-operating  to  a  common  end,  and  keeping  for  ever  alive 
in  his  auditory  the  conviction  that  they  are  listening  to  a 
singularly  able-minded  man. 

This  impression  is  aided  by  his  general  aspect.  His  face, 
without  a  particle  of  pedantic  solemnity,  is  full  of  seriousness 
and  determination.  Whatever  of  lofty  or  refined  emotion 
may  belong  to  the  individual,  never  settles  upon  his  counte- 
nance, and  equally  absent  is  every  trace  of  sentimental  dis- 
content :  but  you  find  there  a  rigid,  statue-like  stability  of 
expression,  importing  consciousness  of  strength  and  immobility 
of  purpose,  and  suggesting  to  those  who  know  his  history  and 
character  an  early  and  deliberate  preparation  for  the  world's 
frown,  and  a  determination  to  retort  it.  His  features,  though 
remarkably  in  unison  with  the  intellectual  and  moral  charac- 
ters impressed  upon  them,  have  few  physical  peculiarities  that 
can  be  conveyed  by  description.  They  are  of  the  hardy 
Celtic  outline,  are  evidently  composed  of  the  most  durable 
materials,  and  still  retain  all  the  compactness  and  rotundity 
of  early  youth.  His  frame,  though  little  above  the  middle 
size,  presents  the  same  character  of  vigor  and  durability,  and 
contributes  its  due  proportion  toward  completing  that  general 
idea  of  strength,  which  I  have  selected  as  most  descriptive  of 
the  entire  man.  The  more  stern  attributes,  however,  that  I 
have  ascribed  to  him,  refer  exclusively  to  the  individual,  as  1 
have  seen  him  in  the  discharged  his  public  duties.  In  the 
intercourse  of  private  life  he  is,  according  to  universal  report, 
of  the  most  frank  and  familiar  manners,  an  extremely  attractive 
companion,  and,  what  is  better  still,  a  warm  and  constant  friend 


272  THOMAS   WALLACE. 

Considering,  as  I  do,  Mr.  Wallace's  mind  to  be  in  its  original 
constitution  what  may  be  denominated  one  of  all-work,  I 
should  say  of  it,  that  among  the  multiform  and  dissimilar 
departments  of  intellectual  exercise  involved  in  the  profession 
of  the  law,  there  was  scarcely  any  for  which  he  could  not  have 
provided  a  corresponding  aptitude  of  faculty.  His  powers 
have,  however,  been  very  much  confined  to  those  classes  of 
cases  in  which  facts,  rather  than  legal  doctrines,  are  the 
subject-matter  of  investigation.  This  may  have  been  partly 
accidental ;  for,  at  the  Irish  bar,  it  is  not  only  a  matter  of 
chance  whether  the  individual  is  to  succeed  at  all,  but  chance, 
in  the  majority  of  instances,  determines  the  particular  facul- 
ties that  must  be  developed  and  permanently  cultivated  for 
the  purpose.  There  the  aspirant  for  professional  eminence 
can  not,  as  in  England,  select  a  particular  department,  and 
make  it  the  subject  of  his  exclusive  study.*  One  comes  to 
the  scene  of  exertion,  relying  upon  his  stores  of  learned  re- 
search and  his  capacity  for  the  solitary  labors  of  the  desk — 
but  the  necessity  of  taking  whatever  business  is  offered,  throws 
him  into  a  totally  dissimilar  line.  He  becomes  a  nisi-prius 
or  motion  lawyer,  upon  compulsion;  strains  his  lungs  in  open 
court,  to  a  pitch  that  neither  nature  nor  himself  had  ever  de- 
signed ;  and  ascertaining  by  experience  that  this  is  to  be  his 
way  of  "  getting  on,"  resigns  his  original  studies  as  unpro- 
ductive toil,  and  concludes  a  prosperous  career,  without  having 
ever  given  an  opinion  upon  a  title,  or  settled  the  draft  of  a  deed 
of  assignment. 

Another  starts  upon  the  strength  of  his  oral  qualifications. 
Full  of  confidence  and  ardor,  and  fired  with  admiration  of 
preceding  models,  he  is  all  for  eloquence  —  and  eloquence  of  the 
highest  order.  He  studies  black-letter,  and  technicalities  as  a 
painful  effort,  but  his  cordial  meditations  are  over  the  defence 
of  Milo,  and  the  immortal  productions  of  the  Athenian  school. 

*  At  the  Irish  as  at  the  American  har,  the  lawyer  takes  all  business  that 
comes  to  him  —  whether  Nisi  Prius,  criminal,  equity,  meixantile,  ecclesias- 
tical, or  civil,  not  declining-  special  pleading  and  conveyancing.  In  England, 
the  lawyer  usually  limits  himself  to  one  line,  on  which  he  concentrates  his 
attention  and  abilities.  The  natural  result  is  that  one  practice  makes  good  gen 
eral  and  the  other  produces  eminent  special  lawyers, — M. 


JUDGE   BURTON."  273 

In  his  ambitious  reveries,  he  sees  before  him  a  brilliant  per- 
spective of  popular  occasions,  with  the  usual  accompaniments 
of  crowded  galleries,  spell-bound  juries,  an  admiring  bench,  an 
applauding  bar  —  but  let  him  take  heed.  It  is  at  all  times  in 
the  power  of  two  or  three  friendly  attorneys,  who  are  in  any 
business,  to  get  him  into  Chancery,  and  keep  him  there,  and 
with  the  best  intentions  imaginable  (if  he  only  prove  compe- 
tent to  the  tasks  assigned,  him)  to  blast  his  fame  for  eloquence 
for  ever.* 

It  does  not,  however,  appear  to  me,  that  Mr.  Wallace  is  one 
of  those  to  whom  any  cross-purposes  of  this  kind  have  assigned 
a  final  destination  that  can  be  reasonably  lamented.  The 
cases  in  which  he  is  in  most  request,  are,  perhaps,  those  in 
which  he  was  originally,  and  still  continues  more  peculiarly 
fitted  to  excel. 

Judging  of  him  from  his  professional  attributes  and  his  col- 
lateral pursuits,  I  am  led  to  infer  that  the  early  and  strongest 
propensity  of  his  mind  was  for  the  discovery  of  truth  ;  or  in  other 
words,  that  he  was  more  of  the  philosopher  than  the  sophist; 
and  it  will,  I  apprehend,  be  generally  found  true,  that  such  an 
intellect,  however  competent  to  seize,  is  less  prone  to  retain 

*  I  could  cite  more  than  one  example  of  persons,  whose  talents  for  public- 
speaking  have  been  thus  suppressed.  I  know  of  only  one  exception  ;  or  to  speak 
more  strictly,  of  an  instance  of  very  uncommon  powers  of  oratory,  breaking  out 
long  after  the  enthusiasm  of  youth  had  passed  away,  and  in  despite  of  a  long  sub- 
jection to  habits  of  an  opposite  tendency.  It  was  that  of  an  Englishman,  the 
present  Mr.  Justice  Burton.  He  had  been  disciplined  in  all  the  severity  of  his 
native  school,  and  forced  his  way  at  the  Irish  bar,  entirely  by  his  legal  superi- 
ority. It  was  only,  when  in  the  regular  course  of  seniority  he  came  to  address 
juiies,  that  it  was  first  discovered  by  others,  and  probably  by  himself,  that  there 
lay  in  the  depths  of  his  mind  a  mine  of  rich  materials  that  had  never  been  ex- 
plored. To  the  last  he  had  to  dig  for  them.  For  the  first  half  hour  he  was  noth- 
ing; it  took  him  that  time  to  reconnoitre  his  subject,  and  get  thoroughly  heated: 
after  that  he  was  —  not  an  accomplished  speaker  —  for  he  never  affected  the 
externals  of  oratory  —  but  in  its  great  essentials  —  unity  of  pm-pose,  and  bold, 
rapid,  and  impassioned  reasoning,  enforced  by  the  vigorous  pi'actical  tones  and 
gestures  of  real  life — possessor  of  an  energy,  that  at  times,  and  often  for  a  long 
time  together,  was  quite  Demosthenic.  [Charles  Burton,  late  one  of  the  puisne 
Judges  of  the  Queen's  Bench  in  Ireland,  was  induced  to  leave  the  English  for 
the  Irish  bar  by  Curran,  and  merited  all  the  praise  here  given  him.  He 
&ed  in  December,  1847,  aged  87,  much  lamented. —  M.J 

is* 


274  THOMAS   WALLACE. 

and  manage,  a  large  mass  of  the  multiform  propositions  of 
English  law,  where  the  terms  in  most  familiar  use  are  often 
subtile  deductions  from  distant  principles  that  are  no  longer 
visible  to  those  who  employ  the  terms  with  most  effect ;  and 
where,  in  fact,  the  process  of  argumentation  may  be  likened 
to  the  working  of  an  algebraic  equation,  in  which  the  final 
result  is  ascertained  by  the  juxtaposition  of  signs  rather  than 
by  a  comparison  of  ideas.  He  has  also  indulged  in  too  con- 
stant a  sympathy  with  the  concerns  of  general  humanity,  to 
have  ever  shrunk  into  a  mere  technical  proficient.  To  form 
the  true  "  Leguleius,  cautus  atque  acutus,"  a  man  must  make  up 
his  mind  to  remain  for  years  and  years  profoundly  indifferent 
to  all  that  passes  beyond  the  precincts  of  his  immediate  calling. 
He  must  take  the  course  of  legislation  as  he  would  the  course 
of  the  stars,  as  things  above  him  ;  and  never  venture,  even  in 
his  most  private  reflections,  to  pry  into  the  policy  of  an  Act  of 
Parliament,  saving  so  far  as  the  preamble  may  be  pleased  to 
enlighten  or  perplex  him  on  that  point.  If  questions  on  the 
Currency  rage  around  him,  he  must  take  no  part,  except  in 
hoping  that  the  decision  will  not  diminish  the  exchangeable 
value  of  the  counsel's  fee.  If  he  chances  to  hear  that  a  bog 
has  burst  from  its  moorings,  or  that  a  blazing  comet  threatens 
to  pounce  upon  our  planet,  he  must  leave  them  to  be  treated 
of  by  the  curious  in  such  matters,  and  go  on  with  his  medita- 
tions over  a  special  demurrer.  He  must  bring  himself,  in 
short,  to  take  no  interest,  direct  or  indirect,  in  aught  that  does 
not  come  home  to  his  learned  self.  His  bag  must  be  to  him 
the  true  sign  of  the  times;  and  as  long  as  it  continues  in  high 
condition,  he  is  to  rest  satisfied  that  human  affairs  must  be 
running  a  prosperous  career. 

Mr.  Wallace  has,  however,  found  constant  and  profitable 
occupation  in  a  branch  of  his  profession,  where  a  proficiency 
does  not  involve  a  corresponding  waste  of  sensibility.  He  is 
in  high  repute  in  jury  cases,  and  still  more  in  those  cases 
where  issues  of  fact  come  under  the  investigation  of  the  court, 
upon  the  sworn  statements  of  the  parties  and  their  witnesses. 
It  was  said  of  the  celebrated  Malone,  that  to  be  judged  of,  ho 
;  frould  be  heard  addressing  "  a  jury  of  twelve  wise  men  ;"  and 


AS   AN   ADVOCATE.  275 

certainly  when  I  consider  the  eminent  qualifications  of  Mr. 
Wallace,  distinguished  as  he  is  for  a  solid  and  comprehensive 
judgment;  for  manly  sagacity  rather  than  captious  subtilty  in 
argument;  for  the  talent  (and  here  he  peculiarly  excels)  of 
educing  an  orderly,  lucid,  and  consistent  statement  out  of  a 
chaotic  assemblage  of  intricate  and  conflicting  facts;  for  his 
knowledge  of  human  nature,  both  practical  and  metaphysical, 
and,  along  with  these,  for  the  sustained  and  authoritative  force 
of  his  language  and  delivery,  which  operate  as  a  kind  of  per- 
sonal warranty  for  the  soundness  of  every  topic  he  advances; 
I  should  say  that  the  most  fitting  place  for  the  exhibition  of 
such  powers  would  be  before  such  a  tribunal  as  the  admirers 
of  Malone  would  have  assigned  him ;  but  a  tribunal,  so  consti- 
tuted, is  not  to  be  found.  The  most  discriminating  of  Irish 
sheriffs  would  be  somewhat  puzzled  in  his  efforts  to  empannel 
a  round  dozen  of  special  sages  in  a  jury-box;  but  though  wis- 
dom in  such  numerical  force  is  not  to  be  met  with,  there  is  a 
tribunal  in  Ireland  (a  novelty  perhaps)  filled,  by  persons,  who 
for  knowledge,  intellect,  and  impartiality,  may,  without  exag- 
geration, be  denominated  "four  wise  men,"  and  who  are  most 
frequently  called  upon  to  serve  as  jurors  in  that  description  of 
cases  in  which  Mr.  Wallace's  professional  superiority  is  most 
acknowledged.*  Those  cases  (in  technical  parlance  called 
"  heavy  motions")  are  more  numerous  in  the  Court  of  King's 
Bench,  partly  from  its  exclusive  jurisdiction,  as  a  court  of 
criminal  law,  and  also  in  no  small  degree  from  its  present 
constitution,  and  the  consequent  influx  of  general  business,  by 
which  the  public  confidence  in  its  adjudications  is  unequivo- 
cally declared. 

*  Mr.  Cumin,  on  one  occasion,  was  trying  a  case  before  Lord  Avonmore 
and  a  stupid  Dublin  Jury,  by  whom  his  best  flights  of  eloquence  and  wit  were 
wholly  unappreciated.  Addressing  them,  with  a  side  glance  at  the  Judge,  he 
Jitated  that  Hesiod,  a  famous  Greek  historian,  had  exactly  expressed  his  views, 
and  quoted  two  lines  of  Latin  !  "  Why,  Mr.  Curran,"  said  the  Judge,  "  Hesiod 
was  a  poet  not  an  historian,  and  the  lines  you  quote  are  not  Greek  but  Latin : 
they  occur  in  Juvenal."  Curran  contended  that  they  wei'e  Greek,  and  the  dis- 
pute grew  warm.  At  last,  Curran  said,  "  Well,  my  lord,  I  see  we  must  disa- 
gree. If  it  were  a  matter  of  law,  I  should  bow  to  your  lordship's  opinion,  but 
it  13  one  of  fact,  and  rests  with  the  Jury  to  decide.  Let  us  send  it  up  as  collat- 
eral issue  to  the  Jury,  and  I'll  be  bound  that  they  will — find  it  Greety!" — ^J, 


276  THOMAS   WALLACE. 

It  is  accordingly  in  this  court  that  Mr.  Wallace,  in  his  ordi- 
nary every-day  manner,  as  an  advocate,  may  be  heard  to  most 
advantage.  His  skill  in  dissecting  a  knavish  affidavit  is  ad- 
mirable, and  renders  him  the  terror  of  all  knavish  deponents 
upon  whom  he  may  have  to  operate.  The  exhibition  is  often 
amusing  enough  to  a  disinterested  spectator.  The  party  whose 
conscience  is  to  undergo  the  ordeal  of  a  public  scrutiny,  may 
be  seen  seated  by  his  attorney  ;  his  countenance  at  first  glow- 
ing with  a  defensive  smirk  of  self-complacent  defiance,  but 
manifesting,  as  the  investigation  into  his  candor  and  veracity 
proceeds,  the  most  marvellous  varieties  of  hue  and  expression. 
An  inconsistency  or  two  are  pointed  out,  and  his  smile  of  an- 
ticipated triumph  gradually  degenerates  into  a  sub-acid  sneer. 
A  fraudulent  suppression  is  next  put  up,  and  then  he  begins  to 
look  at  his  attorney  ;  and,  finding  no  refuge  there,  to  look 
very  grave.  The  counsel  proceeds,  inexorably  accurate  in  his 
detections,  and  caustic  in  his  comments.  Our  worthy  deponent 
begins  now  to  tremble  for  his  reputation,  and  not  without 
reason ;  for  down  come  upon  it  a  succession  of  mortal  blows, 
every  one  of  which  the  listening  crowd,  who  desire  no  better 
sport,  pronounce,  by  a  malignant  buzz,  to  have  been  "  a  palpa- 
ble hit."  This  quickly  brings  on  the  final  stage.  Our  hero, 
"  according  to  the  very  best  of  his  knowledge,  information, 
and  belief,"  is  mortified  and  wrathful  in  the  extreme.  He 
starts  and  frowns  and  shifts  his  posture,  and  compresses  his 
lips,  and  clenches  his  fists  :  he  would  give  worlds  (so  at  least 
says  his  eye;  and  I  would  believe  it  as  soon  as  his  affidavit) 
to  have  just  one  blow  at  the  head  of  his  merciless  torturer,  or 
to  tell  hin>in  open  court  that  he  is  a  calumniator  and  an  assas- 
sin. He  is  on  the  point  of  committing  some  extravagance, 
when  his  attorney  throws  in  a  word  or  two  of  cool  advice,  to 
prevent  his  rage  from  boiling  over,  and  the  paroxysm  gradu- 
ally works  itself  to  rest  in  silent  vows  of  indefinite  vengeance, 
or  in  sotto-voce  murmurings  of  impotent  vituperation. 

In  such  cases  as  the  preceding,  the  severity  of  Mr.  Wallace's 
animadversions  is  forgotten  with  the  occasion;  but  when,  in 
the  discharge  of  his  duty,  he  has  been  impelled  to  be  equally 
unceremonious  in  his  comments   upon   litigants  of  a   higher 


LICENSE  OF  T£E  BAR.  277 

Order,  murmurs  have  arisen,  and  questions  been  started  as  to 
what  are  or  ought  to  be  the  privileges  of  a  barrister,  in  arraign- 
ing the  conduct  and  motives  of  the  parties  to  whom  he  is 
opposed.  The  irritated  suitor  of  course  exclaims  against  a 
license  under  which  he  has  smarted,  as  an  intolerable  griev- 
ance, and  in  general  finds  many  sufficiently  disposed  to  join 
in  his  indignation;  but  no  disinterested  person,  acquainted 
with  human  nature  as  developed  in  the  course  of  our  legal 
proceedings,  and  considering  alone  the  ends  of  justice,  can 
easily  bring  himself  to  desire  that  the  privileges  complained 
of  should  be  in  any  way  abridged.  The  law  makes  a  counsel 
personally  responsible  for  any  injurious  observations  upon  the 
characters  of  individuals  not  warranted  by  his  instructions; 
and  that  those  limits  are  seldom  exceeded  may  be  collected 
from  the  fact,  that  actions  for  slander  of  this  description  are 
unheard-of  in  practice.  But  if  his  instructions  are  manifestly 
libellous,  is  he  not  under  a  paramount  moral  obligation  to 
suppress  the  obnoxious  matter  ?  or  is  every  just  and  honorable 
feeling  of  the  gentleman  to  be  merged  in  the  conventional 
character  of  the  barrister?  The  answer  is  :  —  A  counsel  can 
not  tell  whether  his  instructions  be  true  or  false ;  and  though 
they  should  lean  heavily  upon  an  individual  of  previously 
unblemished  reputation,  he  is  not  on  that  account  to  take  it 
for  granted  that  they  are  calumnious. 

It  is  a  matter  of  daily  experience,  that  litigation  makes 
strange  discoveries  in  the  characters  of  men.  Persons  of  un- 
suspected integrity  no  sooner  become  plaintiffs  or  defendants 
in  a  cause,  than,  blinded  by  self-interest,  or  inflamed  with  the 
silly  desire  of  obtaining  a  victory,  they  are  found  resorting  to 
every  knavish  artifice  to  establish  an  unjust  or  resist,  an  equi- 
table demand.  How,  then,  in  any  given  case  alleged  to  be  of 
this  description,  can  the  counsel  assure  himself  beforehand 
that  the  result  will  falsify  his  instructions?  Is  he,  in  defiance 
of  them,  to  be  incredulous  and  forbearing;  and  from  his 
conjectural  doubts  and  misgivings,  to  put  forward  a  statement, 
so  tame  and  wary  as  to  deprive  his  client  of  the  benefit  of  that 
honest  indignation  in  the  court  or  jury,  which  the  real  facts 
of  the  case  might  justify  1 


9TS  THOMAS   WALLACE. 

The  present  Cliief-Justice  Best*  once  said,  in  conversation 
of  a  barrister  :  "  That  man  is  unfit  to  conduct  a  case  at  the 
Quarter  Sessions  :  he  believes  what  his  client  tells  him." 
There  is  equal  truth  in  the  converse  of  the  proposition.  A 
barrister,  who  should  make  it  a  rule  to  act  upon  the  disbelief 
of  what  his  client  tells  him,  would  prove  equally  incompetent. 
But  still,  it  is  constantly  urged,  the  privilege  thus  contended 
for  produces  much  unwarrantable  vituperation.  To  this  it  may 
be  replied,  that  custom  has  given  to  language  a  peculiar,  qual- 
ified forensic  sense,  just  as  it  has  a  Parliamentary  one  ;  and 
that,  thus  understood,  the  invectives  of  p.ounsel  are  purely 
hypothetical,  and  go  for  nothing,  unless  corroborated  in  proof 
and  sanctioned  by  a  verdict.  If  cleverly  thrown  off,  they  may 
for  the  moment  gratify  the  bystanders,  or  ruffle  the  temper  of 
the  party  against  whom  they  are  directed  —  but  they  leave 
no  stain  upon  his  reputation,  if  twelve  men  upon,  their  oaths 
pronounce  him  to  be  an  honest  man.  The  "  daggers"  that  a 
counsel  "talks,"  are  merely  weapons  handed  up  to  the  jury- 
box:  if  any  of  them  draw  blood,  the  jury  must  strike  the  blow. 
And  it  may  be  further  observed,  that  this  latitude  of  speech 
is  indirectly  of  no  small  service  to  the  ends  of  justice,  by  the 
terrors  it  holds  out  to  persons  who  would  have  no  compunction 
in  speculating  upon  the  chances  of  fraudulent  litigation,  but 
are  ^sufficiently  worldly  and  sensitive  to  shrink  from  a  public 
and  unrestrained  exposure  of  their  iniquity. 

In  judging  of  an  Irish  barrister's  capacity  for  the  higher 
orders  of  forensic  eloquence,  it  is  but  just  to  remember,  that 
in  that  country  great  occasions  are  extremely  rare  ;  and  hence, 

*  William  Draper  Best  was  educated  at  Oxford,  called  to  the  bar  in  1789, 
rose  into  good  practice,  became  Sergeant-at-Law  in  1800,  and  soon  after  was 
made  Chief-Justice  of  Wales  and  Solicitor-General.  In  1802,  he  entered  Parlia- 
ment, where  he  voted  on  the  liberal  side.  In  1819,  he  was  knighted  and 
placed  on  the  bench  as  one  of  the  Justices  of  the  King's  Bench,  and  in  1824, 
was  made  Chief-Justice  of  the"  Common  Pleas,  which  he  resigned  in  1825, 
when  he  was  called  to  the  House  of  Lords,  He  was  a  good  advocate,  a  skil- 
ful lawyer,  an  indifferent  legislator,  an  inconsistent  politician,  and  occasionally 
bo  partial  on  his  summing-up  as  to  be  called  the  "Judge-Advocate."  He  waa 
very  irritable    while  on  lie  bench,  owing  to  bodily  disease. —  M. 


l)tJfiLIN    THEATRE    RIOT.  279 

ho  doubt,  a  habit  that  prevails  there  of  speculating  upon  the 
effects  that  particular  individuals  would  produce,  were  they 
only  supplied  with  opportunities  commensurate  with  their 
powers.  It  was  thus  when  the  Queen's  case  was  raging-,  that 
the  national  pride  of  the  Irish  bar  broke  out  in  vain  regrets  that 
one  of  their  Crown  officers,  a  man  of  surpassing  qualifications 
for  the  conduct  of  such  a  cause,  should  not  have  been  afforded 
such  an  opportunity  of  rising  to  the  highest  summit  of  what  I 
may  call  the  conjectural  fame  that  he  enjoyed  in  his  profession. 
They  pictured  to  themselves  Charles  Kendal  Bushe,  appearing 
at  the  bar  of  the  House  of  Peers,  as  the  presiding  counsel  for 
the  Crown  upon  the  trial  of  that  imperial  issue,  and  uniting 
to  every  solid  requisite  for  the  discharge  of  such  a  duty,  a 
collection  of  peculiar  attributes,  that  seemed  as  if  expressly 
designed  for  swaying  the  decision  of  such  a  tribunal  on  such 
an  occasion.  They  saw  him  there  with  his  matured  profes- 
6ional  skill  and  chastened  eloquence — his  fine  imposing  pres- 
ence—  his  rich,  sonorous  voice  — his  masterly  powers  of  coun- 
tenance, whether  he  spoke  or  listened  —  his  profound,  unre- 
mitting by-play,  now  refuting  by  an  indignant  start,  now 
enforcing  by  a  moral  shudder  —  his  elevated  courage,  and  nat- 
ural grace  of  gesture,  tone,  sentiment,  and  diction,  in  not  one 
of  which  the  most  finished  courtier  of  them  all  could  have 
detected  a  provincialism.  Considering  all  these,  and  the  sub- 
ject, and  the  auditory,  the  admirers  of  this  eminent  and  ac- 
complished person  completed  (and  perhaps  not  unjustifiably) 
the  ideal  picture,  by  representing  to  themselves  as  the  final 
issue,  the  torrent  of  popular  indignation  successfully  stemmed, 
and  the  imperial  diadem  wrested  from  the  brow  of  the  royal 
defendant. 

A  similar  feeling  prevailed  among  many  with  respect  to  Mr. 
Wallace,  upon  the  occasion  of  the  only  political  case  of  any 
moment  that  has  in  latter  years  occurred  in  Ireland — the 
trial  of  the  rioters  at  the  Dublin  theatre.  It  was  one  of  the 
singularities  of  that  case,  that  the  popular  feeling  was  all  on 
the  side  of  the  prosecution,  and  that,  with  the  exception  of 
the  Attorney-General  fPlunketJ,  none  of  the  counsel  for  the 
Crown  were  animated  by  a  warmer  sentiment  than  a  determi- 


280  THOMAS    WALlAtfS. 

nation  to  perform  an  unwelcome  duty.  That  duty  the  Solicitor 
General  [Joy],  who  spoke  to  the  evidence,  performed  with 
legal  ability  and  unquestioned  integrity.  No  one  could  accuse 
him  of  the  insidious  suppression  of  any  doctrine  or  argument 
that  bore  upon  the  case  ;  but  it  was  impossible  for  him  to  be 
eloquent.  All  his  passions  and  prejudices  were  against  his 
cause,  and  he  had  not  the  flexibility  of  temper  to  assume  a 
tone  of  indignant  energy  of  which  he  was  unconscious.  It  is, 
therefore,  easy  to  account  for  the  general  wish  that  such  a  man 
as  Mr.  Wallace  had  supplied  his  place.  He  would  not  have 
allowed  himself  to  have  been  entrammelled  by  any  personal 
or  official  restraints,  but,  giving  the  fullest  scope  to  all  his 
powers,  and  superadding  his  authoritative  denunciations  as 
an  individual  to  his  invectives  as  an  advocate,  would  have 
the  jury  feel  (and  this  was  what  was  wanted)  that  they  were 
themselves  upon  their  trial,  and  must  be  held  by  the  public  to 
be  accomplices  in  the  factious  proceeding  against  which  they 
should  hesitate  to  pronounce  a  verdict  of  conviction. 

The  personal  determination  of  character  and  practical  effi- 
ciency of  talent  for  which  Mr.  Wallace  is  so  distinguished, 
have  been  confined  almost  exclusively  to  his  professional  exer- 
tions ;  but  the  mention  of  those  qualities  brings  to  my  recol- 
lection one  rather  memorable  occasion  upon  which  they  were 
called  into  action,  and  with  a  suddenness  of  result  that  can 
not  be  duly  appreciated  by  any  who  were  not  actual  witnesses 
of  the  scene.  In  the  beginning  of  the  year  1819,  the  friends 
of  the  Catholic  cause,  considering  that  the  time  had  arrived 
when  the  sense  of  the  Protestant  inhabitants  of  the  Irish 
metropolis  might  be  safely  taken  upon  their  question,  deter- 
mined, after  much  anxious  deliberation,  that  a  public  meeting 
of  that  portion  of  the  community  should  be  convened  for  the 
purpose  of  recording  their  sentiments  in  the  form  of  a  petition 
to  Parliament  for  Emancipation.  Though  pretty  confident  of 
success,  they  foresaw  that  the  Orange  faction  would  rise  en 
masse,  to  interpose  every  kind  of  obstruction  to  so  new  and 
obnoxious  an  experiment.  To  prevent  this,  or,  at  the  worst, 
to  be  prepared  for  it,  preliminary  measures  were  taken  for 
giving  the   proposed    assemblage   every   possible   degree    of 


THE   CATHOLIC   MEETING:.  §81 

popular,  and  even  of  aristocratic  eclat.  The  attendance  of  the 
Duke  of  Leinster  and  several  other  peers  was  secured.  The 
name  of  Grattan  stood  at  the  head  of  a  list  of  patriotic  com- 
moners. To  these  were  added  some  leading  men  from  the  Bar, 
and  many  persons  of  opulence  and  weight  from  the  commercial 
classes. 

Such  a  mass  of  respectability,  it  was  hoped,  would  protect 
the  meeting  from  any  factious  obstruction ;  but  among  the 
precautionary  arrangements,  there  was  one  conspicuous  nov- 
elty that  inevitably  provoked  it.  The  Lord-Mayor  of  Dublin 
(Alderman  M'Kenny*),  with  a  courage  that  did  him  infinite 
honor,  consented  to  call  the  meeting,  and  take  the  chair.  The 
Rotunda  was  fixed  upon  as  the  most  convenient  place  for 
assembling;  and  it  had  the  farther  attraction  of  being,  from 
its  associations  with  the  memory  of  the  old  volunteers  of  Ire- 
land, a  kind  of  consecrated  ground,  for  civil  purposes.  But 
the  offence  was  commensurate.  That  a  chief  magistrate  of  the 
city  of  Dublin,  the  corporation's  "own  anointed,"  should  be 
so  lost  to  all  sense  of  monopoly  and  intolerance,  as  to  give 
the  sanction  of  his  presence  at  such  a  place,  on  such  an  occa- 
sion, was  an  innovation  of  too  perilous  example  to  pass 
unpunished.  The  aldermanic  body  quivered  with  indigna- 
tion; the  tUommon  Council  foamed  with  no  common  rage  ;  the 
corporate  sensibilities  of  the  minor  guilds  burst  forth  in  vows 
and  projects  of  active  vengeance.  Before  the  appointed  day 
arrived,  it  was  matter  of  notoriety  in  Dublin,  that  a  formidable 
plan  of  counteraction  had  been  matured,  and  was  to  be  put 
into  execution. 

On  the  morning  of  the  meeting,  some  of  the  principal  requi- 
sitionists  assembled  at  Oharlemont  house  to  make  the  necessary 
arrangements  for  the  business  of  the  day.  They  continued 
there  until  it  was  announced  that  the  Lord-Mayor  had  arrived, 
and  was  ready  to  take  the  chair,  Avhen  they  proceeded  through 
the  adjoining  gardens  of  Rutland  square,  toward  one  of  the 
back-entrances  of  the  Rotunda.  There  was  something  pecu- 
liarly  dispiriting    in    their    appearance,   as    they    slowly  and 

*  Thomas  M'Kenny,  bom  July,  1770  ;  created  a  baronet,  September,  1831 ; 
Hod  October,  1849.  — M. 


$&(2  THOMAS   WALLACE. 

silently  wound  along  the  narrow  walks,  more  like  a  funeral 
procession  tlian  a  body  of  men  proceeding  to  bear  a  part  in 
a  patriotic  ceremony  ;  but  every  sentiment  of  popular  ardor 
was  chilled  by  the  apprehension  that  an  effort,  from  which  the 
most  beneficial  results  had  been  anticipated,  might  terminate 
in  a  scene  of  disgraceful  tumult. 

Even  the  presence  of  Grattan,  who  was  in  the  midst  of  them, 
had  lost  its  old  inspiring  influence.  His  name,  his  figure,  his 
venerable  historic  features,  his  very  dress  —  a  threadbare  blue 
surtout,  of  the  old  Whig-club  uniform,  buttoned  closely  up  to 
the  chin,  and  giving  him  something  of  the  air  of  a  veteran 
warrior :  all  these  recalled  the  great  national  scenes  with 
which  his  genius  and  fame  were  identified.  But  the  more 
vivid  the  recollection,  the  more  powerful  the  present  contrast. 
The  despondency  of  age  and  of  declining  health  had  rested 
upon  his  countenance.  Instead  of  the  rapid  and  impatient 
movements  with  which,  in  the  days  of  his  pride  and  strength, 
he  had  been  wont  to  advance  to  the  contest,  launching  de- 
fiance from  his  eye,  and  unconsciously  muttering  to  himself, 
as  he  paced  along,  some  fragments  of  his  impending  har- 
angue, all  was  now  tardiness,  and  silence,  and  quietude,  even 
to  collapse. 

As  they  approached  the  building,  the  cheerings  of  the  multi- 
tude within  burst  forth  through  the  open  windows.  The  well- 
known  sound  for  a  moment  roused  the  veteran  orator  ;  but 
the  impression  was  evanescent.  There  was  no  want  of  excite- 
ment in  the  spectacle  within.  Upon  entering  the  grand  room 
of  the  Rotunda,  they  found  about  four  thousand  persons,  the 
majority  of  them  red-hot  Irish  politicians,  congregated  within 
its  walls.  The  group  I  have  described  made  their  way  to  the 
raised  platform,  upon  which  the  Lord-Mayor  had  just  taken 
the  chair,  and  where  a  vacant  space  upon  his  right  had. been 
reserved  for  them.  The  left  was  occupied  by  a  detachment 
from  the  Corporation,  headed  by  a  formidable  Alderman. 

The  Lord-Major  opened  the  business  of  the  day  by  reading 
'the  requisition,  and  explaining  his  reasons  for  having  called 
the  meeting.  "Murmurs  on  the  left,"  in  the  midst  of  which 
ap  rose  the  leader  of  the  civic  host  to  commence  the  precou 


A    JJtSORDERL?   MEETING.  2 S3 

certed  plan  of  operations.  Without  preface  or  apology,  he 
called  upon  the  chairman  to  dissolve  the  meeting.  He  cau- 
tioned him,  as  the  preserver  of  the  puhlic  peace,  not  to  perse- 
vere in  a  proceeding  so  pregnant  with  dangers  to  the  tranquil- 
lity of  the  city.  Let  him  only  look  at  the  assemblage  heibre 
him,  which  had  been  most  unadvisedly  brought  together  under 
the  sanction  of  his  name,  and  reflect,  before  it  was  too  late, 
upon  the  frightful  consequences  that  must  ensue,  when  their 
passions  should  come  to  be  heated  by  the  discussions  of  topics 
of  the  most  irritating  nature.  Was  it  for  this  that  the, loyal 
citizens  of  Dublin  had  raised  him  to  his  present  high  trust?  Was 

it  to  preside  over  scenes  of  riot,  perhaps  of "     Here  the 

worthy  alderman  was  interrupted,  according  to  his  expecta- 
tions, by  tumultuous  cries  "  to  order."  A  friend  from  the  left 
rushed  forward  to  sustain  him ;  a  member  of  the  opposite 
party  jumped  upon  the  platform  to  call  him  to  order,  and  was 
in  his  turn  called  to  order  by  a  corporator. 

Thus  it  continued  until  half  a  dozen  questions  of  order  were 
at  once  before  the  chair,  and  as  many  persons  simultaneously 
bellowing  forth  their  respective  rights  to  an  exclusive  hearing. 
To  put  an  end  to  the  confusion,  the  chairman  consented  to 
take  the  sense  of  the  meeting  on  a  motion  for  an  adjournment, 
and  having  put  the  question,  declared  (as  was  the  fact)  that 
an  immense  majority  of  voices  was  against  it.  This  was  de- 
nied by  the  left  side,  who  insisted  that  regular  tellers  should 
be  appointed.  A  proposition,  at  once  so  unnecessary  and  im- 
practicable, revealed  their  real  object,  and  was  received  with 
bursts  of  indignation;  but  they  persevered,  and  a  scene  of  ter- 
rific uproar  ensued.  It  continued  so  loud  and  long,  that  those 
who  surrounded  the  chair  became  seriously  alarmed  for  the 
result.  They  saw  before  them  four  thousand  persons,  inflamed 
by  passion,  and  immured  within  a  space  from  which  a  speedy 
exit  was  impossible.  In  addition  to  the  general  excitation, 
violent  altercations  between  individuals  were  already  commen- 
cing in  remoter  quarters  of  the  meeting,  and  if  a  single  blow 
should  be  struck,  the  day  must  inevitably  terminate  in  blood»\» 
shed. 

At  this  moment,  when  the  tumult  was  at  its  height,  two  fig 


284  THOMAS  WALLACE. 

urcs  particularly  attracted  attention;  —  the  first  from  its  in- 
trinsic singularity  — it  was  that  of  a  noted  city  brawler  (his 
name  I  now  forget)  who  had  contrived  to  perch  himself  aloft 
upon  a  kind  of  elevated  scaffolding  that  projected  from  the 
loyal  corner  of  the  platform.  He  was  a  short,  sturdy,  'half- 
dwarfish,  ominous-looking  caitiff,  with  those  peculiar  propor- 
tions, as  to  both  person  and  features,  which,  without  being 
actually  deformed,  seem  barely  to  have  escaped  deformity. 
There  was  a  certain  extra-natural  lumpish  confirmation  about 
his  neck  and  shoulders,  which  gave  the  idea  that  the  materials 
composing  them  must  have  been  originally  intended  for  a 
hump;  while  his  face  was  of  that  specific,  yet  non-descript 
kind,  which  is  vulgarly  called  a  phiz  —  broad,  flat,  and  sal- 
low, with  glaring  eyes,  pug  nose,  thickish  lips,  and  around 
them  a  circle  of  jet-black  (marking  the  region  of  the  beard) 
which  neither  razor  nor  soap  could  efface. 

The  demeanor  of  this  phenomenon,  who  brandished  a  crab- 
stick  as  notorious  in  Dublin  as  himself,  and  wore  his  hat  with 
its  narrow  upturned  brim  inclined  to  one  side  (the  Irish  sym- 
bol of  being  ready  for  a  row)  was  so  impudent  and  grotesque 
as  to  procure  for  him  at  intervals  the  undivided  notice  of  the 
assembly.  His  corporation  friends  let  fly  a  jest  at  him,  and 
were  answered  by  a  grin  from  ear  to  ear.  This  was  sure  to 
be  followed  by  a  compact  full-bodied  hiss  from  another  quar- 
ter of  the  meeting,  and  instantaneous  was  the  transition  in  his 
countenance,  from  an  expression  of  buffoonish  archness  to  one 
of  almost  maniacal  ferocity.  This  "  comical  miscreant,"*  con- 
temptible as  he  would  have  been  for  any  other  purpose,  proved 
a  most  effective  contributor  to  the  scene  of  general  disturb- 
ance. Apart,  at  the  opposite  extremity  of  the  platform,  in 
view  of  this  portent,  and  exposed  to  his  grimaces  and  ribald 
vociferations,  sat  Henry  Grattan,  a  silent  and  dejected  spec- 
tator of  the  turmoil  that  raged  around  him.  The  contrast  was 
at  once  striking  and  afflicting,  presenting,  as  it  were,  a  visible 

*  This  was  a  phrase  taken  from  speeches  and  letters  of  O'Connell,  in  1825, 
during  a  dispute  with  Cobbett,  in  which  a  great  deal  of  abuse  passed  on  both 
sides.  O'Connell  had  rather  the  best  of  the  quarrel,  his  vocabulary  of  stinging 
adjectives  being  very  large  indeed. —  M. 


HIS   LITERARY    PURSUITS.  28c 

type  of  the  condition  of  his  country,  in  the  triumph  of  vulgai 
and  fanatical  clamor  over  all  the  efforts  of  a  long  life,  exclu 
sively  devoted  to  her  redemption. 

But  to  resume: — The  confusion  continued,  and.  the  symp- 
toms of  impending  riot  were  becoming  momentarily  mor* 
alarming,  when  Mr.  Wallace  (to  whom  it  is  full  time  to  return, 
had  the  merit  of  averting  such  a  crisis.  In  a  short  interval 
of  diminished  uproar,  one  of  the  most  prominent  of  the  dis- 
turbers was  again  on  his  legs,  and  recommencing,  for  the  tenth 
or  twentieth  time,  a  disorderly  address  to  the  chair,  when  Mr. 
Wallace,  who  had  not  previously  interfered,  started  up  from 
his  seat  beside  the  chairman,  advanced  toward  the  speaker, 
and  called  him  to  order.  The  act  itself  was  nothing  —  the 
tone  and  manner  everything.  There  was  in  the  latter  a  stern, 
determined,  almost  terrific  energy,  which  commanded  imme- 
diate and  universal  silence.  In  a  few  brief  sentences,  he  de- 
nounced the  palpable  design  that  had  been  formed  to  obstruct 
the  proceedings,  exposed  the  illegal  and  indecent  artifices  that 
had  been  resorted  to,  and  insisted  that  the  parties  who  were 
dissatisfied  with  the  decision  of  the  chair  on  the  question  of 
adjournment,  should  forthwith  conform  to  the  established  usage 
in  such  cases,  and  leave  the  room.  The  voice  of  authority, 
and  something  more,  in  which  this  was  said,  produced  the  de- 
sired effect.  The  multitude  shouted  forth  their  approbation. 
The  civic  chieftain,  after  performing  astonishing  feats  of 
aldermanship,  judged  it  prudent  to  retire  without  a  further 
struggle.  He  was  followed  by  his  corps  of  discontents,  about 
fifty  in  number,  and  the  business  of  the  day,  after  a  suspen- 
sion of  two  hours,  proceeded  without  interruption. 

Mr.  Wallace  is  one  among  the  few  of  the  present  leading 
men  at  the  Irish  Bar,  who  have  dedicated  much  time  to  liter- 
ary pursuits.  His  general  reading  is  understood  to  be  various 
and  extensive.  In  the  year  1796,  two  years  before  he  was 
called  to  the  Bar,  he  composed  an  essay  on  the  variations,  in 
the  prose  style  of  the  English  language,  from  the  period  of  tht 
Revolution,  which  obtained  the  gold  medal  prize  of  the  Roya 
Irish  Academy.  It  is  written  with  much  elegance,  is  entirely 
free  from  juvenile  or  national  finery,  and  bears  evident  mark? 


286  THOMA.S   WALLACE. 

of  those  powers  of  discrimination  which  were  afterward  to  pro- 
cure for  the  possessor  more  substantial  results  than  academic 
honors.  In  the  same  year  he  published  a  treatise  of  consider- 
able length  upon  the  manufactures  of  Ireland.  The  latter  I 
have  never  seen,  but  I  have  heard  an  anecdote  regarding  it 
which  may  be  mentioned  as  illustrative  of  the  purity  with 
which  Irish  academic  justice  was  in  those  days  administered. 
It  was  originally  composed,  like  the  former,  as  a  prize-essay. 
The  academy  hesitated  between  it  and  the  rival  production 
of  one  of  their  members,  a  Mr.  Preston,  and  referred  the  decis- 
ion to  a  committee.  The  committee  deputed  the  task  to  a 
sub-committee,  and  the  latter  to  three  persons,  of  whom  Mr. 
Preston  was  one.  The  prize  was  accordingly  adjudged  to 
that  gentleman's  production,  and  Mr.  Wallace  revenged  him- 
self of  the  academy  by  publishing  his  work,  and  prefixing  to 
it  a  detailed  account  of  the  transaction. 

In  concluding  my  notice  of  this  able  person,  I  have  only 
to  add,  that  if  he  should  ever  enter  Parliament,  it  may 
be  safely  predicted  that  his  career  there  will  be  neither 
"mute"  nor  "  inglorious."  His  manliness,  integrity,  and  de- 
termination, as  well  as  his  general  talents,  would  be  soon  found 
out  in  that  assembly,  and  insure  him  upon  all  occasions  a  re- 
spectful hearing.  The  enlightened  portion  of  the  Irish  admin- 
istration would  find  in  him  a  strenuous  supporter  of  no  ordinary 
value;  and  the  country  at  large  (independently  of  the  benefit 
of  his  other  exertions)  would  have  a  security  that  no  hackney- 
ed and  scandalous  misrepresentations  of  its  condition,  no  matter 
from  whose  lips  they  might  come,  would  be  allowed  to  pass 
in  his  presence  without  peremptory  contradiction  and  rebuke. 


WEXFORD   ASSIZES. 

I  am  an  Irish  Barrister,  and  go  the  Leinster  Circuit.*  I 
keep  a  diary  of  extra-professional  occurrences  in  this  half- 
yearly  round,  a  sort  of  sentimental  note-book,  which  I  preserve 
apart  from  the  nisi  prius  adjudications  of  the  going*  judges  of 
assize.  In  reading  over  my  journal  of  the  last  Circuit,  I  find 
much  matter  which  with  more  leisure  I  could  reduce  into  bet- 
ter shape.  I  shall  content  myself  for  the  present  with  an 
account  of  the  last  assizes,  or  rather  of  myself  during  the  last 
assizes  of  Wexford,  presuming  that  I  do  little  more  than  tran- 
scribe the  record  of  my  own  feelings  and  observations  from  a 
diary,  to  which,  as  I  have  intimated,  they  were  committed 
without  any  intention  that  they  should  be  submitted  to  the 
public  eye.  This  will  account  for  the  character  of  the  inci- 
dents, and  the  want  of  classification  in  their  detail. 

I  set  off  from  Dublin  on  the  17th  of  July,  1825,  in  the  mail- 
coach.  In  England,  a  barrister  is  not  permitted  to  travel  in  a 
public  vehicle,  lest  he  should  be  placed  in  too  endearing  a 
juxtaposition  to  an  attorney.  But  in  Ireland  no  such  prohibi- 
tion exists ;  and  so  little  aristocracy  prevails  in  our  migrations 
from  town  to  town,  that  a  sort  of  connivance  has  been  ex- 
tended to  the  cheap  and  rapid  jaunting-cars,  by  which  Signor 
Bianconi  (an  ingenious  Italian)  has  opened  a  communication 
between  almost  all  the  towns  in  the  south  of  Ireland.f     Be  it, 

*  Sheil,  who  went  the  Leinster  Circuit,  wore  no  disguise  in  this  sketch, 
which  he  originally  named,  "  Diary  of  a  Barrister  during  the  last  Wexford 
Assizes." — M. 

t  Charles  Bianconi  established  a  system  of  cheap  and  rapid  travelling  in  Ire- 
land, on  what  are  called  Outside  Jaunting-cars,  which  he  spread  all  over  the 
country,  from  1823  until  the  advent  of  Railwayism,  which  has  necessarilv  con- 


288  WEXFOED   ASSIZES. 

however,  remembered,  that  it  was  not  in  an  Irish  vis-a-vis,  that 
I  passed  through  the  ancient  city  of  Ferns.  Doctor  Elrington, 
the*  present  Bishop  of  Clogher,  resides  in  its  immediate  vicin- 
ity ;  his  palace  is  visible  from  the  road. 

A  word  or  two  about  the  doctor.*  He  had  been  Provost  of 
Trinity  College,  and  was  raised  to  this  important  office  by  Mr. 
Perceval,  to  whom  he  recommended  himself  by  some  mystical 
lucubrations  upon  the  piety,  povevty,  and  simplicity  of  the  Irish 
Church.  They  were  distinguished  by  a  laborious  flimsiness,  and 
exhibited  a  perfect  keeping  between  the  understanding  of  the 
writer  and  his  heart :  they  smelt  of  a  lamp  which  was  fed  with 
rancid  oil.  The  present  Archbishop  of  Dublinf  had  been  the 
competitor  of  Elrington  for  the  first  station  of  the  University. 
His  eminent  abilities  gave  him  in  his  own  opinion,  and  I 
should  add,  in  the  judgment  of  the  University,  a  paramount 
claim.  But  at  that  time  he  had  the  plague-spot  of  liberality 
in  his  character.  The  stain  has  been  since  effaced,  but  it  was 
still  apparent  when  he  presented  himself  to  the  Minister. 

Doctor  Magee  used  to  give  a  somewhat  amusing  account 
of  his  reception  by  the  flippant  personage  who  was  then  at  the 
head  of  the  State.  He  threw  out  some  broad  hints  as  to  the 
principles  in  which  the  Protestant  youth  of  Ireland  ought  to 
be  educated ;  and  said  that  the  office  had  been  given  away. 

tracted  his  operations.  Public  convenience  and  private  economy  were  alike 
served  by  Mr.  Bianconi,  who  has  made  a  large  fortune,  is  now  a  Magistrate  in 
Tipperary  (where  he  has  purchased  estates),  and  has  served  the  office  of  Mayor 
of  Clonmell.— M. 

*  Dr.  Elrington  was  a  great  pamphleteer,  who  distinguished  himself  by  illib- 
erality  as  Provost  of  Trinity  College,  Dublin,  and  took  in  a  double  supply,  when 
he  became  Bishop.     He  was  reputed  to  be  a  good  classical  scholar. — M. 

t  Dr.  William  Magee,  born  in  1765,  was  educated  at  Dublin  University, 
when  he  became  Professor  of  Oriental  languages.  In  1806,  he  was  a  senior 
fellow  of  the  College,  and,  soon  after  Professor  of  Mathematics.  After  being 
successively  Dean  of  Cork  and  Bishop  of  Rapboe,  he  was  made  Archbishop 
of  Dublin  in  1822.  His  chief  literary  work,  published  in  1801,  was  on  the 
subject  of  The  Atonement  —  on  this,  which  obtained  great  popularity,  he  at- 
tacked Unitarianism  with  Orthodox  zeal,  acuteness,  and  learning.  He  became 
strongly  anti-Catholic  in  politics  after  his  last  preferment,  and  disappointed 
the  hopes  which  arose  out  of  his  previous  moderation.  Archbishop  Maget 
lied  in  1831,  aged  sixty-six. —  M 


SPENCER   PERCEVAL.  289 

M  Let  me  see"  (said  Mr.  Perceval,  in  the  Doctor's  description), 
"let  me  see  —  yes,  his  name  is  Doctor  Ellington,  I  have  Ins 
pamphlets  upon  tithes;  he  has  demonstrated  their  divine 
origin.  How  much  such  men  are  wanted  in  these  dangerous 
times  !"*  The  mistake  made  by  the  Minister  in  pronouncing 
the  name  of  his  successful  rival  (which  he  hardly  knew),  pro- 
duced an  increased  secretion  of  gall  in  the  Doctor,  to  which 
he  used  to  give  vent  in  many  a  virulent  gibe.  At  this  time  he 
was  Mr.  Plunket's  friend,  and  his  own  enemy.  But  Perceval's 
admonition  was  not  lost  upon  him.  He  perceived  that  he  had 
taken  a  wrong  course,  and,  selecting  his  competitor  as  his 
example,  speedily  improved  upon  his  model.  But  let  him 
pass. 

Doctor  Elrington,  while  a  fellow  of  the  college,  published 
an  edition  of  Euclid.  A  schoolboy  might  have  given  it  to  the 
world.  But  such  is  the  state  of  the  Irish  Protestant  Univer- 
sity, that  by  constituting  an  exception  to  the  habits  of  inte 
lectual  sloth  which  prevail  over  that  opulent  and  inglorious 
corporation,  even  an  edition  of  Euclid  confers  upon  a  fellow  of 
the  university  a  comparative  title  to  respect. 

When  Provost,  he  was  a  rigid  disciplinarian.     He  attracted 
public  attention  by  two  measures :  he  suppressed  the  Histori- 

*  Spencer  Perceval,  son  of  the  Earl  of  Egmont,  was  born  in  1762,  practised 
a  Chancery  barrister,  and  was  brought  into  Parliament  by  Mr.  Pitt.  He 
6ecame  leading  Counsel  on  the  Midland  Circuit.  When  Pitt  was  about  fight- 
ing a  duel  with  Mr.  Tierney,  he  told  Lord  Harrowby  that,  if  he  fell,  Perceval 
was  the  most  competent  person  to  succeed  him  as  Prime  Minister  and  opponent 
to  Fox  —  an  opinion  of  his  powers  few  else  have  held.  In  1801,  he  became 
Solicitor-General  under  Addington's  Ministry,  resigned  office  on  Pitt's  death, 
and  became  Prime  Minister  on  the  death  of  the  Duke  of  Portland  in  1807, 
which  was  on  May  11,  1812,  when  he  was  shot  through  the  heart,  in  the  lobby 
of  the  House  of  Commons,  by  a  madman  named  Bellingham,  who  was  tried, 
condemned,  and  executed.  On  his  death  an  annuity  of  two  thousand  pounds 
sterling  a  year  was  voted  to  his  wife  and  fifty  thousand  pounds  sterling  for  her 
twelve  children ;  the  lady  married  again,  with  very  little  delay.  Perceval, 
with  an  admirable  private  character  (which  made  Moore  write  on  his  death 
"  We  forgot  in  that  hour  how  the  statesman  had  erred, 
And  we  wept  for  the  father,  the  husband,  the  friend"), 
was  intolerant  in  politics  and  religion.  Dying  as  he  did,  by  the  violent  hand 
of  an  assassin,  even  his  opponents  mourned  for  him  — M. 

Vol.  I.— 13 


290  WEXFORD   ASSIZES. 

cal  Societ}^,  and  issued  a  proclamation  against  witchcraft. 
Special  orders  were  given  by  the  Doctor  against  the  raising 
of  the  Devil.  The  library  of  Trinity  College  is  filled  with 
hooks  of  necromancy  ;  and,  apprehending  that  the  students 
might  be  reduced  into  a  commerce  with  the  Fiend,  the  Doctor 
gave  peremptory  directions,  that  the  ponderous  and  worm- 
eaten  repertories  of  the  Black  art  should  not  be  unclasped.  A 
scholar  of  the  house,  who  appears  to  have  had  a  peculiar  predi- 
lection for  the  occult  sciences,  complained  of  the  restraint  which 
the  Doctor  had  taken  upon  himself  to  put  upon  his  intercourse 
with  the  "  Prince  of  the  Air,"  and  called  the  former  to  account 
in  a  visitation,  at  which  Lord  Chief-Justice  Downes  (not  very 
appropriately)  presided,  as  the  representative  of  His  Royal 
Highness  the  Duke  of  Cumberland.*  I  do  not  recollect  the 
decision  of  his  Lordship  upon  this  important  question,  but,  if  I 
may  be  allowed  to  conjecture  from  his  intellectual  habits,  I 
can  not  help  suspecting  that  any  appeal  to  the  statutes  of 
James  I.  must  have  been  conclusive,  in  his  mind,  in  favor  of 
the  injunction  against  sorcery.  Shortly  after  this  exploit 
against  the  Devil,  the  Doctor  was  raised  to  the  see  of  Limerick, 
and  upon  the  detection  of  his  sanctimonious  and  detestable 
predecessor,t  he  was  promoted  to  the  bishopric  of  Clogher.  He 
resides  in  a  noble  palace,  which  arrests  the  attention  of  the 
traveller  in  his  way  to  Wexford,  and  affords  an  illustration  of 
that  apostolic  poverty,  in  which  the  teachers  of  the  reformed 
religion  embody  its  holy  precepts. 

Wexford  is  a  very  ancient  town.  It  was  formerly  sur- 
rounded by  walls,  a  part  of  which  continue  standing.  They 
are  mantled  with  ivy,  and  are  rapidly  mouldering  away; 
but  must  once  have  been  of  considerable  strength.  The 
remains  of  an  old  monastery  are  situate  at  the  western  gate. 

*  The  Duke  of  Cumberland,  iifth  son  of  George  ill.,  succeeded  to  the  Crown 
of  Hanover,  in  1837,  on  the  death  of  William  IV.,  and  died  in  1851.  In  Eng- 
land he  was  extremely  unpopular,  but  the  Hanoverians  liked  and  regretted  him. 
He  was  elected  Chancellor  of  Trinity  College,  Dublin,  in  1805,  and  for  many 
years  Grand  Master  of  the  Orangemen  of  Great  Britain  and  Ireland. —  M. 

t  Percy  Jocelyn,  son  of  the  Earl  of  Roden,  was  Bishop  of  Clogher,  and  was 
deposed  by  his  clergy,  in  1824,  for  having  been  detected  in  the  commission  of 
aji  unnatural  crime. —  M. 


THE    OLD    MONASTERY.  291 

By  a  recent  order  of  vestry  (at  which  Catholics  are  not  per- 
mitted to  vote),  a  tax  was  laid  on  the  inhabitants  for  the 
erection  of  a  new  church  upon  the  site  of  the  monastic  ruin. 
Upon  entering  Wexford  I  missed  a  portion  of  the  old  build- 
ing. I  walked  into  its  precincts,  and  found  that  some  of 
the  venerable  arches  of  the  ancient  edifice  had  been  thrown 
down,  to  make  way  for  the  modern  structure.  The  work  of 
devastation  had  been  going  on  among  the  residences  of  the 
dead.  A  churchyard  encompasses  these  remains  of  Christian 
antiquity;  and  I  observed  that  many  a  grave  had  been  torn 
up,  in  order  to  make  a  foundation  for  the  new  Protestant 
church.  The  masons  who  had  been  at  work  the  preceding 
day,  had  left  some  of  their  implements  behind  them.  To 
behold  the  line  and  the  trowel  in  the  grave,  would  be  at  any 
time  a  painful  spectacle;  but  this  violation  of  the  departed 
becomes  exasperating  to  our  passions,  as  well  as  offensive  to 
our  religious  sentiments,  when  it  is  occasioned  by  an  invasion 
of  the  ancient  and  proper  demesne  of  the  almost  universal 
faith  of  the  people.  Fragments  of  white  bones  had  been 
thrown  up,  and  lay  mingled  with  black  mould  upon  the  green 
hillocks  of  the  adjoining  dead.  "Why  should  not  that  be 
the  skull  of  an  Abbot?"  I  exclaimed,  as  I  observed  the  frag- 
ments of  a  huge  head  which  had  been  recently  cast  up  :  "  little 
did  he  think,  that,  in  the  very  sanctuary  of  his  monastic  splen- 
dor, he  should  ever  be  '  twitched  about  the  sconce'  by  a  rude 
heretical  knave,  and  that  a  Protestant  shovel  should  deal  such 
profanation  upon  a  head  so  deeply  stored  with  the  subtilties  of 
Scotus,  and  the  mysteries  of  Aquinas!" 

After  passing  some  minutes  in  "chewing  the  cud  of  these 
bitter  fancies,"  I  became  weary  of  my  meditations  among  the 
dead,  and  strolled  toward  the  Quay  of  Wexford,  upon  which 
both  church  and  chapel  had  poured  out  all  their  promiscuous 
contents.  Here  was  a  large  gathering  of  young  damsels,  who, 
after  having  gone  through  their  spiritual  duties,  came  to  per- 
form the  temporal  exercises  of  an  Irish  Sabbath.  There  was 
a  great  display  of  Wexford ian  finery.  The  women  of  Wexford 
of  the  better  class  have,  in  general  a  passion  for  dress,  to  which 
I  have  heard  that  they  sacrifice  many  of  their  domestic  com- 


292  WEXFORD   ASSIZES. 

forts.  This  little  town  is  remarkable  for  a  strange  effort  at 
saving  and  display.  It  is  not  uncommon  to  see  ladies,  who 
reside  in  small  and  indifferently  furnished  lodgings,  issuing 
from  dark  and  contracted  lanes  in  all  the  splendor  which  mil- 
linery can  supply.  This  tendency  to  extravagance  in  dress  is 
the  less  excusable,  because  Nature  has  done  so  much  for  their 
faces  and  persons,  as  to  render  superfluous  the  efforts  of  Art. 
The  lower,  as  well  as  higher  classes,  are  conspicuous  for  beauty. 

There  are  two  baronies  in  this  county,  in  one  of  which  the 
town  is  situate,  the  inhabitants  of  which  are  descended  from  a 
colony  planted  by  the  first  English  settlers,  who  never  having 
intermingled  their  blood  with  the  coarser  material  of  the  coun- 
try, have  retained  a  perfectly  characteristic  physiognomy,  and 
may  be  distinguished  at  a  glance  from  the  population  of  the 
adjoining  districts.  The  Irish  face,  although  full  of  shrewd- 
ness and  vivacity,  is  deficient  in  proportion  and  grace.  Before 
you  arrive  in  Wexford,  in  traversing  the  craggy  hills  which 
overhang  it,  you  meet -with  countenances  at  every  step,  which 
are  marked  by  a  rude  energy  and  a  barbarous  strength. 
Through  the  clouds  of  smoke  that  roll  from  the  doors  of  a 
hovel  of  mud,  you  may  observe  the  face  of  many  an  Hibernian 
damsel  glowing  with  a  ruddy  and  almost  too  vigorous  health, 
made  up  of  features  whose  rudeness  is  redeemed  by  their  flex- 
ibility and  animation,  with  eyes  full  of  mockery  and  of  will,  and 
lips  that  seem  to  provoke  to  an  encounter  in  pleasantry,  for 
which  they  are  always  prepared.  The  dress  of  the  genuine 
Irish  fair  is  just  sufficient  to  conceal  the  more  sacred  of  their 
symmetries,  but  leaves  the  greater  portion  of  their  persons  in  a 
state  of  brawny  and  formidable  nudity.  But  when  you  de- 
scend from  the  hills  to  the  eastern  coast,  you  are  immediately 
struck  with  a  total  dissimilarity  of  look,  and  can  not  fail  to 
notice  a  peculiarly  English  aspect. 

I  am  disposed  to  think  the  young  women  of  the  lower  class 
in  the  baronies  of  Forth  and  Bargy,  even  more  graceful  and 
feminine  than  the  most  lively  of  the  English  peasantry,  whom 
I  have  ever  had  occasion  to  notice.  Their  eyes  are  of  deep 
and  tender  blue,  their  foreheads  are  high  and  smooth,  their 
cheeks  have  a  clear  transparent  color,  and  a  sweetness  of 


THE   WEXFORD   PEASANTRY.  293 

expression  sits  on  their  full  fresh  lips,  which  is  united  with 
perfect  modesty,  and  renders  them  objects  of  pure  and  respect- 
ful interest.  They  take  a  special  care  of  their  persons,  and 
exhibit  that  tidiness  and  neatness  in  their  attire,  for  which 
their  English  kindred  are  remarkable.  I  have  often  stopped 
to  observe  a  girl  from  the  barony  of  Forth,  in  the  market  of 
Wexford,  with  her  basket  of  eggs  or  chickens  for  sale,  and 
wished  that  I  were  an  artist,  in  order  that  I  might  preserve 
her  face  and  figure.  Her  bonnet  of  bright  and  well-plaited 
straw  just  permitted  a  few  bright  ringlets  to  escape  upon  hei 
oval  cheek:  over  her  head  was  thrown  a  kerchief  of  muslin  tc 
protect  her  complexion  from  the  sun.  Her  cloak  of  blue  cloth, 
trimmed  with  gray  silk,  hung  gracefully  from  her  shoulders. 
Her  boddice  was  tightly  laced  round  a  graceful  and  symmetri- 
cal person.  Her  feet  were  compressed  in  smart  and  well- 
polished  shoes ;  and  as  she  held  out  her  basket  to  allure  you 
into  a  purchase  of  her  commodities,  lier  smile,  with  all  its  win- 
ningness,  was  still  so  pure,  that  you  did  not  dare  to  wish  that 
she  should  herself  be  thrown  into  the  bargain. 

It  is  clear  that  the  peasantry  of  these  districts  are  a  superior 
and  better-ordered  tribe.  Industry  and  morality  prevail  among 
them.  Crime  is  almost  unknown  in  the  baronies  of  Forth  and 
Bargy.  The  English  reader  will  probably  imagine  that  they 
must  be  Protestants.  On  the  contrary,  the  Roman  Catholic 
religion  is  their  only  creed,  and  all  efforts  at  proselytism  have 
wholly  failed.  It  has  often  been  considered  as  singular  that 
the  Irish  rebellion  should  have  raged  with  such  fierceness 
among  this  moral  and  pacific  peasantry.  Some  are  disposed 
to  refer  the  intensity  of  their  political  feelings  to  their  attach- 
ment to  the  Catholic  religion ;  but  I  believe  that  the  main 
cause  of  the  temporary  ferocity  into  which  they  were  excited, 
and  in  the  indulgence  of  which  they  for  a  while  threw  off  all 
their  former  habits,  had  its  origin  from  the  excesses  of  which  a 
licentious  soldiery  were  guilty,  and  that  the  dishonor  of  their 
wives  and  daughters  impelled  them  to  revenge  and  blood. 

I  have  extended  my  description  of  the  inhabitants  of  these 
two  Saxon  districts  (for  they  may  be  so  called)  beyond  the 
limits  I  had  proposed.     But  I  write  in  a  desultory  fashion,  upon 


2&4  WEXFORD   ASSIZES. 

matters  which  are  in  themselves  somewhat  unlinked  together 
While  I  was  wandering  up  and  down  the  quay  of  Wexford, 
and,  after  having  fed  my  eyes  to  satiety,  was  beginning  to  yield 
to  the  spirit  of  oscitation  which  is  apt  to  creep  upon  a  lawyer 
on  the  sabbath,  a  gentleman  had  the  goodness  to  invite  me  to 
accompany  him  up  the  river  Slaney,  to  a  fine  wood  upon  the 
banks  of  the  stream,  where  he  proposed  that  his  party  should 
dine  upon  the  refreshments  with  which  his  barge  was  copiously 
stored.  I  gladly  took  advantage  of  this  very  polite  invitation  ; 
the  wind  Avas  favorable,  and  wafted  us  along  the  smooth  and 
glassy  stream  with  a  rapid  and  delightful  motion.  The  banks 
are  remarkable  for  their  beauty.  On  the  right  hand,  as  you 
proceed  up  the  river,  the  seat  of  the  La  Hunt  family  offers  a 
series  of  acclivities  covered  with  thick  and  venerable  wood. 
The  temperature  of  the  air  is  so  soft,  and  the  aspect  so  much 
open  to  the  mid-day  sun,  that  shrubs  which  are  proper  to  south- 
ern latitudes  grow  in  abundance  in  these  noble  plantations. 
At  every  turn  of  the  stream,  which  winds  in  a  sheet  of  silver 
through  a  cultivated  valley,  landscapes  worthy  of  the  pencil 
of  Gainsborough  or  of  Wilson  are  disclosed.  Castles,  old 
Danish  forts,  the  ruins  of  monasteries,  and,  I  should  add,  the 
falling  halls  of  absentees,  appear  in  a  long  succession  upon  both 
sides  of  the  stream. 

I  was  a  good  deal  struck  with  a  little  nook,  in  which  a  beau- 
tiful cottage  rose  out  of  green  trees,  and  asked  who  was  the 
proprietor.  It  had  been  built,  it  seems,  by  Sir  H.  Bate  Dud- 
ley, the  former  proprietor  of  the  "Morning  Herald,"  who  re- 
sided for  some  time  upon  a  living  given  to  him  in  this  diocese. 
I  was  informed  that  he  was  respected  by  all  classes,  and  be- 
loved by  the  poor.*  His  departure  was  greatly  regretted. 
Not  far  from  Sir  H.  Bate  Dudley's  cottage  is  the  residence  of 
Mr.  Devereux,  of  Carrick  Nana.     He  is  said  to  be  descended 

*  Henry  Bate  Dudley  (born  1745,  died  1824)  was  a  clergyman,  who  spent 
most  of  his  time  in  literary,  political,  and  convivial  society,  and  (despite  his 
■'acred  profession)  fought  several  duels !  He  wrote  some  plays,  and  found- 
ed two  daily  newspapers  yet  published  in  London  —  the  Morning  Post  and  the 
Morning  Herald.  He  was  made  a  baronet  and  obtained  valuable  church  pre- 
ferment from  the  influence  these  Journals  gave  him. —  M. 


A   PIO-NIC   IN    THE    WOODS.  295 

from  a  brother  of  William  the  Conqueror,  and  certainly  belongs 
to  one  of  the  most  ancient  families  in  Ireland.  The  political 
race  of  this  gentleman  is  so  honorably  ardent,  that  he  has  gone 
to  the  expense  of  collecting  portraits  of  all  the  parliamentary 
friends  of  Emancipation,  and  devoted  a  gallery  to  the  purpose. 

After  passing  his  seat,  we  saw  Mount  Leinster,  towering  in 
all  its  glory  before  us,  with  the  sun  descending  upon  its  peak. 
Having  reached  the  point  of  our  destination,  we  landed  in  a 
deep  and  tangled  wood,  and  sat  down  to  dinner  in  a  cave 
which  overhangs  the  stream.  While  we  were  sitting  in  this 
spot,  which  I  may  justly  call  a  romantic  one,  a  sweet  voice 
rose  from  the  banks  beneath,  in  the  music  of  a  melancholy  air. 
It  was  what  I  once  heard  a  poor  harper  call  "a  lonesome  air." 
I  do  not  know  whether  certain  potations  compounded  of  a  liquor 
which,  in  our  love  of  the  figurative,  we  have  called  "mountain 
dew,"  might  not  have  added  to  the  inspiration  of  the  melody. 
When  it  ceased,  we  proceeded  to  discover  the  fair  vocalist  who 
had  uttered  such  dulcet  notes,  and  whom  one  of  us  compared 
to  the  lady  in  "  Oomns."  What  was  our  disappointment,  when, 
upon  approaching  the  spot  from  which  the  music  had  proceed- 
ed, we  found  an  assembly  of  Sabbatarian  wassailers,  who  gave 
vent  to  a  loud  and  honest  laugh  as  we  arrived  !  The  echoes 
took  up  their  boisterous  merriment,  which  reverberated  through 
the  woods  and  hills.  The  songstress  who  had  so  enchanted  us 
was  little  better  than  a  peasant-girl. 

These  good  people,  who  were  sitting  in  a  circle  round  a  huge 
jug  of  punch,  had  resolved  to  participate  in  the  beauty  of  Na- 
ture, of  which  we  are  all  tenants  in  common,  and,  like  ourselves, 
had  roved  out  from  the  town  to  dine  in  the  wood.  They  en- 
tered their  boat  at  the  same  time  that  we  pushed  off  from  the 
bank,  and  accompanied  us.  It  was  now  evening.  The  broad 
water  was  without  a  ripple.  The  sun  had  gone  down  behind 
Mount  Leinster,  and  a  rich  vermilion  was  spread  over  the  vast 
range  of  lofty  and  precipitous  hills  that  bound  the  western 
horizon.  The  night  was  advancing  from  the  east,  toward  which 
our  boats  were  rapidly  gliding.  The  woods  which  hang  upon 
the  banks,  had  thrown  their  broad  shadows  across  the  stream. 
We  reached  the  narrow  pass  where  the  remains  of  a  palace  of 


296  WftXFORi)    ASSIZES. 

King  John,  which  is  still  called  "  Shaun's  Court,"  stand  upon 
the  river,  while  the  Tower  of  Fitzstephen  rises  upon  the  other 
bank.  This  was  the  first  hold  raised  by  the  English  upon 
their  landing.  It  is  built  on  a  rock,  and  commands  the  gorge 
in  which  the  Slaney  is  at  this  point  narrowly  compressed. 
While  our  barge  was  carried  along  the  dark  water,  the  fair 
vocalist,  who  was  in  the  other  boat,  was  prevailed  upon  to  sing 
an  Irish  melody :  our  oars  were  suspended.  Without  any 
knowledge  of  music,  she  possessed  a  fine  voice,  and  was  not 
destitute  of  feeling.  She  selected  an  old  Irish  air,  to  which 
Moore  has  appropriately  allied  the  misfortunes  of  Ireland. 
Wexford  is  the  birthplace  of  the  poet;*  and  as  liis  beautiful 
words  passed  over  the  waters,  I  could  not  avoid  thinking  that 
in  his  boyhood  he  must  often  have  lingered  amidst  the  hills 
which  surrounded  us,  in  which  the  liveliness  of  Nature  is  asso- 
ciated with  so  many  national  recollections.  It  is  not  impossi- 
ble that  his  mind  may  have  taken  its  first  tinge  from  these 
scenes,  which  it  is  difficult  for  even  an  ordinary  person  to  con- 
template without  a  mournful  emotion.  The  enchanting  melan- 
choly of  the  air,  which  is  commonly  called  "  The  Coulin,"  and 
which  was  sweetly  and  inartificially  sung,  went  deeply  into 
our  hearts.f  The  impression  left  by  the  poetry  and  the  music, 
which  were  so  well  assisted  by  a  beautiful  locality,  did  not 
soon  pass  away. 

While  our  spirits  were  still  under  the  influence  of  the  feel- 
ings which  had  been  called  forth  by  these  simple  means,  the 
lights  of  the  town  of  Wexford  were  descried.  As  we  ap- 
proached, I  perceived  the  arches  of  the  bridge,  which  stretches 
its  crazy  length  from  the  town  to  the  opposite  side  of  the  river. 
It  was  upon  that  bridge  that  the  infuriated  insurgents,  upon 
becoming  masters  of  Wexford,  collected  their  prisoners,  and 
murdered  them  in  what  I  was  going  to  call  cold  blood  :  but  the 

*  This  is  an  error.  Thomas  Moore's  "  old  gouty  grandfather,  Tom  Codd" 
(as  mentioned  in  the  poet's  auto-biography)  lived  in  the  Corn  Market,  Wex- 
ford, and  Moore  himself  states  that  his  birth  occurred  on  the  28th  May,  1779, 
at  No.  12  Aungier  street,  Dublin.  He  died  at  Sloperton  Cottage,  Wiltshire, 
England,  on  Feb.  26,  1852.— M. 

t  The  beautiful  Melody  alluded  to,  is  that  commencing  "  Though  the  last 
glimpse  of  Erin  with  sorrow  I  see." — M. 


THE   BRIDGE   OF   WEXFORD.  297 

phrase  would  be  an  inappropriate  one.  The  passions  of  the 
people,  which  had  been  heated  to  the  utmost  intensity  in  the 
course  of  that  frightful  contest,  had  not  lost  their  rage  at  the 
time  that  they  were  guilty  of  that  terrific  slaughter. 

A  gentleman  who  sat  by  my  side  had  attested  most  of  the 
events  to  which  I  am  alluding.  As  we  neared  the  memorial 
of  that  horrible  event  (for  the  bridge  of  Wexford  has  almost 
become  impassable,  and  scarcely  serves  any  other  purpose  than 
that  of  preserving  the  recollection  of  the  sanguinary  misdeeds 
enacted  upon  it),  I  inquired  the  details  of  the  massacre.  He 
told  me  that  some  ninety  persons,  of  both  sexes,  were  placed 
by  the  rebels  upon  the  bridge;  that  their  fate  was  intimated 
to  them ;  and  that  they  were  desired  to  prepare  for  death. 
The  Catholic  clergy  interposed,  without  effect.  The  insurgents 
were  bent  upon  revenge  for  the  wrongs  which  most  of  them  had 
individually  sustained,  and  ferociously  appealed  to  the  blood 
upon  their  own  doors  in  vindication  of  what  they  had  resolved 
to  perpetrate.  Their  unfortunate  victims  fell  upon  their  knees, 
and  cried  out  for  mercy.  "  You  showed  it  not  to  our  children/' 
was  the  answer;  and  to  such  an  answer  no  replication  can  be 
given  in  a  civil  war.  At  the  appointed  moment,  the  gates  of 
the  bridge  were  thrown  open,  and  the  work  of  death  was  al- 
most instantaneously  completed. 

We  had  now  approached  sufficiently  near  the  bridge  to  per- 
ceive its  mouldering  timbers  with  distinctness,  and  to  hear  the 
plash  of  the  waters  against  its  rotten  planks.  I  am  not  guilty 
of  any  affectation  when  I  say  that,  the  sound  was  peculiarly 
dismal.  The  continuous  dash  of  the  wave  at  all  times  (what- 
ever be  the  cause,  and  I  leave  it  to  metaphysicians  to  assign 
it)  disposes  the  mind  to  a  mournful  mood.  Perhaps  it  is  that 
the  rush  of  water,  of  which  we  are  warned  by  its  momentary 
interruption,  suggests  the  ideas  of  transitoriness,  and  presents 
an  image  of  the  fleeting  quality  of  our  existence.  But  there 
was  something  in  the  sound  of  the  river,  as  it  broke  upon  the 
piles  of  decayed  and  bending  timber  that  sustain  the  'bridge 
of  Wexford,  of  a  peculiarly  melancholy  and  more  than  com- 
monplace kind.  I  could  not  help  thinking,  as  I  surveyed  that 
decayed  but  still  enduring  fabric  (why  does  not  the  tide  wash 

.    .    . 13* 


£98  WEXFORD   ASSlZEB. 

it  into  the  sea?),  that  upon  those  shattered  boards,  and  weect- 
mantled  planks,  there  had  been  many  a  wretch  who  clung  with 
a  desperate  tenacity  for  a  little  longer  life,  until  a  thrust  of 
the  insurgent's  pike  loosened  the  grasp  of  agony,  and  the 
corpse,  after  whirling  for  a  moment  in  the  eddies  beneath,  was 
wafted  into  the  ocean,  and  became  the  sea-bird's  perch. 

Such  were  the  feelings  with  which  I  could  not  help  looking 
upon  this  memorial  of  the  shame  and  disasters  of  my  country. 
A  few  clays  after,  there  occurred  in  this  very  spot  a  scene 
which  tended  rather  to  rivet  than  to  weaken  the  political  inter- 
est with  which  the  bridge  of  Wexford  ought  to  be  surveyed. 
Mr.  O'Oonnell  was  brought  as  special  counsel  to  Wexford  : 
the  people  determined  to  pay  him  all  the  honors  which  it  was 
in  their  power  to  bestow. 

It  was  decided  that  an  aquatic  procession,  if  I  may  use  the 
phrase,  should  meet  him  at  Fitzstephen's  Tower,  and  that  he 
should  be  attended  by  the  citizens  from  the  ground  where  the 
English  had  fixed  the  foundations  of  their  dominion.  The 
Counsellor  was  accordingly  met,  at  the  pass  which  I  have  de- 
scribed, by  a  fleet  of  boats,  and  was  forced  to  step  into  a  trium- 
phal barge,  manned  by  the  choicest  rowers  that  conld  be  procured. 
They  were  dressed  in  green  jackets  lined  with  gold.  A  large 
flag  of  the  same  emblematical  color,  with  a  harp  without  a 
crown,  floated  from  the  stern.  An  immense  multitude  were 
assembled  upon  the  banks,  and  a  vast  number  of  boats  crowd- 
ed the  river.  The  Counsellor  entered  the  patriotic  barge  with 
a  show  of  reluctance,  and  took  his  seat.  Three  cheers  were 
given. 

"  Considunt  rastris  ;  intentaque  brachia  remist 
Intenti  expectant  signum,  exsultantiaque  baurit 
Corda  pavor  pulsans,  laudumque  onesta  cupido. 
Inde,  ubi  clara  dedit  sonitum  tuba,  finibus  omnes 
Haud  mora,  pi-osiluere  suis:  ferit  aetheia  clamor 
Nauticus :  adductis  spumant  freta  versa  lacertis." 

The  spectacle  exhibited  in  Wexford  upon  this  occasion  was 
a  striking  one.  The  whole  Catholic  population  poured  forth 
to  greet  Mr.  O'Connell,  and  thousands  gathered  upon  the  quay 
and  bridge  of  Wexford   to  hail  his  arrival.     The  Protestants, 


CHIEF- JUSTICE   BUSHE.  290 

who  find  in  every  incident  of  this  kind  an  association  with  the 
events  of  1798,  stood  with  an  expression  of  deep  and  angry 
gloom  in  the  midst  of  all  the  turbulent  exultation  of  theii' 
Popish  fellow-citizens.  I  observed  groups  of  silent  and  scowl- 
ing men,  whose  physiognomies  did  not  permit  me  to  doubt 
their  religion.  They  muttered  a  few  words  to  each  other,  and 
seemed  to  gripe  their  hands  as  if  they  felt  the  yeoman's  sabre 
already  in  their  grasp.  The  Catholics  were  either  heedless 
of  their  anger,  or  derided  its  impotence.  They  were  assem- 
bled in  vast  numbers  upon  the  bridge,  which  tottered  beneath 
their  weight.  At  le.ngth  the  Counsellor's  barge  came  in  sight. 
A  cheer  followed  every  stroke  of  the  oar,  and  at  length  he 
reached  the  point  selected  for  his  reception  in  the  city,  and 
stepped  from  his  barge  upon  the  bridge,  which,  I  suppose,  in 
the  eyes  of  the  Protestant  portion  of  the  spectators,  grew  red 
beneath  his  footsteps.  In  their  disturbed  imaginations  every 
footprint  was  marked  with  blood. 

The  assizes  opened  upon  Tuesday,  the  19th  July,  1825. 
The  judges  were  the  Chief-Justice  of  the  King's  Bench,  and 
Mr.  Justice  Johnson,  judge  of  the  Court  of  Common  Pleas.  The 
former  regularly  goes  the  Leinster  circuit ;  some  of  his  imme- 
diate friends  and  kindred  are  upon  it.  Charles  is  the  name 
of  the  Chief-Justice,  and  the  constellated  lights,  by  which  he 
is  surrounded,  have  been  called  his  "  wain."  It  is  natural 
that  a  feeling  of  disrelish  for  this  undeviating  adherence  to 
Leinster  should  exist  at  the  Bar,  and  it  is  equally  natural  that 
Chief-Justice  Buslie  should  disregard  it.  The  ancient  resi- 
dence of  his  family  (which  settled  in  Ireland  in  the  reign  of 
Charles  the  Second)  is  situate  in  the  county  of  Kilkenny.  It 
is  for  many  reasons  most  dear  to  him.  His  attachment  to  this 
domestic  spot  does  not  arise  from  a  mere  idle  pride  of  honora- 
ble birth,  but  takes  its  origin  in  a  most  noble  action.  Although 
not  bound  to  do  so,  he  sold  his  paternal  property  to  pay  his 
father's  debts,  repurchased  it  with  the  profits  of  his  industry 
and  his  genius,  and  now  holds  the  estate  of  his  forefathers  by 
a  better  title  than  descent. 

Lord  Redesdale's  nephew,  Mr.  Mitford,  who  was  deposited 
in  Ireland   by  his  able  uncle,  has  a  great  talent  for  drawing. 


300  WEXFORD   ASSIZES, 

One  of  Ills  best  pictures  Langs  over  the  chimney  of  the  prin- 
cipal room  at  Kilmurry  (the  seat  of  the  Chief  Justice)  and 
appropriately  represents  Sterne's  story  of  "  The  Sword."  The 
subject  was  felicitously  chosen.*  It  is  impossible  that  the 
Chief-Justice  should  not  feel  a  strong  attachment  to  a  mansion 
which  affords  an  evidence  at  once  of  his  genius  and  of  his  vir- 
tues; and  it  would  be  strange  if  he  did  not  exercise  the  priv- 
ilege of  selection  which  belongs  to  his  judicial  rank  in  favor 
of  a  circuit  upon  which  his  own  property  is  situate,  in  almost 
immediate  contiguity  to  every  town  in  which  it  is  his  office  to 
preside.  It  is  also  to  be  observed,  that  in  Kilkenny  he  is  en- 
compassed by  his  own  near  associates  and  friends ;  and  it  is 
but  a  jnst  indulgence  in  a  sentiment  of  virtuous  pride,  that  he 
should  desire  to  exercise  his  high  functions  among  those  who 
experience  an  unaffected  pleasure  at  witnessing  the  elevation 
which  he  has  attained. 

With  respect  to  the  imputed  charge  of  favoritism,  the  per- 
sons who  are  most  disposed  to  find  fault  with  this  eminent  in- 
dividual, can  not  point  out  any  specific  instance  in  which, 
from  a  partiality  to  the  advocate  he  has  manifested  the  least 
bias  toward  the  client ;  and  if  suitors,  upon  a  calculation  of  the 
general  frailty  of  our  nature,  should  indulge  in  the  hope  that 
the  leaning  of  the  judge  is  to  be  secured  by  employing  the 
supposed  object  of  his  predilection,  it  were  too  much  to  expect 
that  he  should  offer  a  homage  to  suspicion,  and,  by  giving 
way  to  it,  yield  to  a  certain  extent  an  acquiescence  in  its  jus- 
tice. For  my  own  part,  I  am  not  at  all  disposed  to  attach 
blame  to  him  for  persevering  in  his  uniform  adoption  of  their 
same  circuit,  as  long  as  judges  are  permitted  by  the  law  to  do 
so.  "Why  should  a  peculiar  exception  be  made  against  him  1 
Other  judges  are  equally  constant  in  their  local  likings,  and 
yet  no  complaints  are  made  against  them. 

*  In  "The  Sentimental  Journey  through  France  and  Italy."  It  is  a  beauti- 
ful episode,  and  few  descriptions  have  as  much  simple  pathos  as  this  which 
brings  before  us  the  Marquis,  who  had  deposited  his  sword,  with  the  States  of 
Rennes,  in  Brittany,  returning  after  twenty  years'  pursuit  of  wealth,  in  com- 
merce, to  reclaim  the  weapon  having  rebuilt  the  broken  fortunes  of  his  ancient 
house. —  M. 


CHIEF-JUSTICE    BUSHE.  301 

111  England,  too,  judges  are  in  the  habit  of  going  the  same 
circuit  without  incurring  the  popular  displeasure.  While  the 
law  stands  as  it  does,  no  complaint  can  justly  be  made  of  any 
individual  for  consulting  his  own  convenience  in  these  regards. 
It  might,  however,  be  matter  for  consideration,  whether  the 
statute  which  prevented  judges  from  presiding  in  their  own 
counties,  ought  not  to  be  re-enacted.  That  statute  which  was 
repealed  in  Ireland,  at  the  instance,  it  is  said,  of  the  ex-Judge 
Day,*  who  was  fond  of  the  picturesque,  and  wishing  to  visit 
the  Lakes  of  Killarney  twice  a  year,  expressed  a  solicitude  to 
preside  at  the  assizes  of  Kerry.  Such  a  wish,  when  the  Union 
was  in  concoction,  was  not  to  be  disregarded.  How  far  it  is 
contrary  to  public  policy  to  allow  of  this  perpetual  return  of 
the  same  judge  to  the  same  circuit,  admits  of  doubt.  It  is 
hard  for  a  man  of  the  purest  mind  to  divest  himself  of  precon- 
ceptions, formed  by  intimate  and  reiterated  observation.  A 
judge  is  apt  to  take  local  views  where  he  contracts  topical 
connections,  and  may  consider  it  necessary  to  administer  jus- 
tice with  more  rigor  in  districts  with  the  habits  of  criminality 
of  which  he  may  have  acquired  a  peculiar  intimacy.  A 
stronger  anxiety  for  the  suppression  of  atrocities  in  his  own 
immediate  vicinage  is  almost  inevitable.  Offences  committed 
at  our  own  door  appear  not  only  more  formidable,  but  enor- 
mous. The  blood  spattered  at  our  very  threshold,  leaves  be- 
hind it  a  deeper  die. 

It  is,  however,  but  just  to  add,  that  if  there  be  any  judge, 
from  whose  constant  attendance  of  the  Leinster  circuit,  not 
only  no  positive  evil,  but  an  actual  benefit  arises,  it  is  Charles 
Kendal  Bushe.  As  far  as  my  observation  extends,  he  is  per- 
fectly impartial.  The  rank  or  the  religion  of  parties  has  no 
sort  of  weight  with  him;  and  to  every  case,  whatever  may  be 
the  circumstances  attending  it,  he  gives  an  equal  and  un- 
biased hearing.  His  attention  to  the  interests  of  the  lower 
orders,  evinced  by  the  extraordinary  solicitude  with  which  he 
investigates  their  rights  in  the  trial  of  civil  bill  appeals,  is 
above  all  praise.  It  was  formerly  usual  to  hear  civil  bills  at 
the  close  of  the  assizes  of  Clonmel  ;  and  the  persons  interested, 

*  Jurl^e  Day,  of  liberal  polil  :&,  was  a  very  intimate  friend  of  Grattan. —  M 


302  WEXFORD    ASSIZES. 

who  are  almost  always  of  the  humbler  class,  were  kept  in 
anxious  and  expensive  attendance  for  a  whole  week  upon  the 
court.  Poor  creatures,  whose  very  being  was  involved  in  the 
result  of  their  appeals,  were  assembled  in  a  dismal  gathering 
in  the  town,  and,  before  their  causes  were  heard,  had  expended 
nearly  the  whole  amount  of  the  sum  decreed  against  them,  in 
awaiting  the  capricious  pleasure  of  the  judge  to  reverse  the 
sentence  of  the  inferior  tribunal.  When  this  branch  of  busi- 
ness was  called  on,  the  judge  was  generally  impatient  to  leave 
the  town,  and  hurried  with  a  careless  precipitation  through 
matters  which,  however  insignificant  in  the  mind  of  the  weal- 
thiest suitor,  were  of  permanent  moment  to  the  wretched  peas- 
ants who  flocked  to  the  assizes  for  redress.  The  Chief-Justice 
has  reformed  those  crying  abuses,  and  devotes  as  much  consid- 
eration to  the  trial  of  minor  cases  as  to  causes  of  the  greatest 
magnitude.  He  has,  by  introducing  this  practice,  which 
could  not  have  been  established  by  him  without  a  continued 
selection  of  the  circuit,  conferred  signal  advantages  upon  the 
public. 

With  respect  to  the  interests  of  the  Bar,  although  some  of 
his  more  immediate  friends  are  supposed  to  derive  a  benefit 
from  his  countenance,  it  should  be  remembered,  in  the  first 
place,  that  they  are  persons  of  high  merit ;  and  it  should  not 
be  forgotten,  that  to  every  member  of  the  Bar  the  Chief-Justice 
is  so  undeviatingly  polite,  that  no  individual  can  justly  tax 
him  with  having  done  him  any  immediate  wrong.  I  am  much 
inclined  to  think,  that  there  is  great  exaggeration  in  the  esti 
mate  of  those  advantages  supposed  to  arise  from  the  favor  of 
any  judge;  and  even  if  I  were  disposed  to  accord  in  the  opin- 
ion, that  individuals  can  be  indebted  for  any  essential  portion 
of  their  success  to  the  influence  of  the  judicial  smile,  the  ac- 
complished manners,  the  liberal  and  enlightened  spirit,  the 
great  endowments,  and  the  patient  industry,  of  the  Chief- 
Justice,  would  outweigh,  in  my  mind,  every  inferior  and  per- 
sonal consideration. 

Mr.  Justice  Johnson  was  joined  with  the  Chief- Justice  in 
the  commission.  He  is  the  brother  of  the  ex-judge  of  that 
xamo,  who  wrote  the  celebrated  letters  of  Juverna,  and  who 


JUDGE   JOHNSON.  303 

is  justly  accounted  one  of  the  ablest  men  in  Ireland.*  The 
two  brothers  are  men  of  eminent  talents,  but  wholly  dissimilar 
in  character.  The  political  writer  is  calm,  ironical,«biting,  and 
sarcastic,  and  uses  shafts  of  the  finest  temper,  steeped  in 
venom.  The  present  judge  is  vehement,  impetuous,  frank, 
and  vigorous;  and  while  the  one  shoots  his  finely-feathered 
arrows,  the  other  whirls  about  a  massive  and  roughly-knotted 
club.  He  is  warm  and  excitable,  and  effervesces  in  an  instant. 
This  suddenness  has  its  origin  in  the  goodness  of  his  nature. 
If  he  suspects  collusion  or  fraud,  or  gets  the  least  hint  of 
baseness  in  any  transaction,  he  immediately  takes  fire.  In 
these  moods  of  explosive  honesty,  there  is  something  formida- 
ble to  a  person  who  does  not  know  that  the  ebullitions  of  integ- 
rity subside  as  rapidly  as  they  break  out;  and  that,  with  all 
these  indications  of  angry  temperament,  he  is  in  reality  a  kind 
and  tractable  man.  At  the  same  time  we  must  beware  of  wan- 
tonly provoking  him.  "  Noli  irritare  leonem,"  is  a  precept 
which  the  contemplation  of  his  countenance  has  sometimes 
recalled  to  me.  His  deep  voice  that  issues  upon  a  hunter  of 
subtleties  in  a  roar,  his  broad  and  massive  face,  a  pair  of  pon- 
derous brows  that  overhang  his  flashing  eyes,  a  certain  shaggi- 
ness  of  look,  and  a  start   of  the  whole  body  with  which  he 

*  There  were  two  Johnsons,  William  and  Robert,  sons  of  an  apothecary  in 
Dublin.  Both  became  Judges.  Robert,  &  puisne  in  the  Common  Pleas,  wrote 
a  paper,  published  by  Cobbett,  against  Lord  Redesdale,  on  circumstances  con 
nected  with  Emmett's  trial.  This  paper  was  considered  a  libel,  and  O'Grady, 
then  Attorney-General,  proceeded  against  Johnson.  After  a  world  of  argu- 
ment, Judge  Johnson  was  actually  kidnapped,  conveyed  from  Ireland  to  Eng- 
land, tried  for  ihe  libel,  convicted,  and  proceedings  stopped  on  condition  of  his 
resigning  his  Judgeship,  which  he  did  —  receiving  twelve  hundred  pounds 
sterling  annual  pension  for  life.  Curran  was  his  Counsel  in  Ireland,  and  in  a 
speech  in  this  case  he  appealed  to  Lord  Avonmore,  who  presided,  in  the  name 
of  their  early  friendship,  and  the  happy  hours  they  had  passed  together.  Quo- 
ting from  Cowley,  he  said  — 

*  We  spent  them  not  in  toys,  or  lust,  or  wine ; 

But  search  of  deep  philosophy, 

Wit,  eloquence,  and  poesy  — 
Arts  which  I  loved  ;  for  they,  my  friend  !  were  thine." 
There  had  been  a  coolness  between  them,  but  Avonmore  sent  for  Curran,  when 
the  Court  rose   threw  himself  into  his  arms,  while  his  eyes  were  yet  wet  with 
tears,  and  they  were  friends  again. —  M 


804  WEXFORD   ASSIZES. 

erects  himself,  suggest  the  image  of  that  "fine  animal"  to  my 
mind.  This  learned  and  excitable  person,  with  all  this  sudden- 
ness of  emotion,  is  extremely  good  and  kind-hearted  ;  and, 
although  he  may  now  and  then  say  a  rough  thing,  never  aims 
a  deliberate  blow  at  the  feelings  or  reputation  of  any  man. 
As  a  criminal  judge,  he  is  truly  merciful  and  compassionate  ; 
and  as  a  civil  one,  is  learned,  sagacious,  and  acute.  In  the 
Court  of  Common  .Pleas,  he  exhibits  much  more  irritability 
than  upon  circuits.  He  is  exasperated  by  the  witticisms  of 
Lord  Norbury,  who  says  that  his  brother  is  like  a  young  horse, 
and  wishes  to  draw  the  entire  coach  himself.  To  adopt  his 
lordship's  illustration,  it  must  be  owned  that  he  kicks  and 
plunges  when  yoked  with  "  that  gallant  gray,"  but  pulls  single 
exceedingly  well. 

No  trial  of  any  very  considerable  interest,  except  that  of  the 
action  of  Nunn  against  Wyse,  which  has  been  detailed  in  the 
English  papers,  occurred  during  the  last  assizes  :  but,  in  look- 
ing over  my  diary,  I  find  a  sketch  which  I  made  at  the  time 
of  a  very  important  case,  which  was  tried  by  Judge  Johnson 
during  a  preceding  circuit,  and  which  it  may  gratify  the  curi- 
osity of  the  English  reader  to  have  transcribed.  I  allude  to 
the  prosecution  of  Father  Carroll,  the  Wexford  priest,  who 
killed  a  child  in  a  fit  of  insanity,  under  circumstances  which 
greatly  excited  the  public  attention. 

This  unfortunate  man,  for  he  deserves  no  harsher  appella- 
tion, had  from  his  childhood  a  strong  predisposition  to  insanity. 
It  was  with  great  difficulty  that  he  succeeded  in  obtaining  ordi- 
nation. His  aberrations  from  reason,  before  they  amounted  to 
actual  madness,  were  connected  with  the  subject  of  exorcism  ; 
and  although  every  person  to  whom  he  addressed  his  argu- 
ments in  favor  of  the  expulsion  of  devils,  smiled  at  his  extrav- 
agance, they  still  could  not  help  acknowledging  that  he  argued 
with  sub  til  ty  upon  wrong  premises,  and  confessed  that  his 
applications  of  various  passages  in  the  holy  writings  were 
ingenious,  however  mistaken.  It  was  in  vain  that  Father  Car- 
roll was  told  that  the  power  of  Satan  to  possess  himself  of 
human  bodies  ceased  with  the  revelation  of  Christian  truth. 
He  appealed  to  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles,  and  tc  incidents  sub« 


father  Carroll's  trial.  305 

sequent  to  the  death  of  our  Savior,  to  establish  his  favorite 
speculation.  A  medical  man,  with  whom  he  was  intimate, 
perceived  that  the  subject  had  laid  such  a  hold  upon  his  natu- 
rally excitable  imagination,  that  he  resorted  to  sedative  med- 
icines, to  avert  the  progress  of  an  incipient  malady  to  which 
he  had  an  organic  predisposition.  As  long  as  he  followed  his 
physician's  advice,  he  abstained  from  any  acts  of  a  very  ex- 
travagant nature;  but  unhappily,  before  the  events  took  place 
which  formed  the  ground  of  a  capital  prosecution,  he  neg- 
lected to  take  his  usual  preventives,  and  became  utterly  de- 
ranged. 

He  suddenly  fancied  himself  endowed  with  supernatural 
authority.  This  fantastic  notion  seized  upon  him  in  the  midst 
of  divine  service;  after  the  wild  performance  of  which,  he 
rushed  into  the  public  road  that  led  from  the  chapel  to  his 
house,  in  search  of  an  object  for  the  manifestation  of  his  mira- 
culous powers.  He  was  informed  that  a  laborer  by  the  name 
of  Neill  was  confined  by  illness  to  his  bed;  and  being  con- 
vinced that  he  was  possessed  by  an  evil  spirit,  proceeded  to 
effect  the  removal  of  the  enemy.  His  singular  demeanor  at- 
tracted the  attention  of  the  passengers,  who  followed  him  to 
Neill's  cottage;  which  he  had  no  sooner  entered  than  he  pre- 
cipitated himself  upon  the  sick  man,  and  began  his  miraculous 
operations  with  marvellous  vigor.  A  severe  pommelling  was 
the  process  of  exorcism  which  he  regarded  as  most  effectual. 
This  he  put  into  immediate  and  effectual  practice.  Neill  did 
not  attempt  to  resist  this  athletic  antagonist  of  the  devil.  The 
unhappy  gentleman  had  determined  to  take  Beelzebub  by 
storm.  After  a  long  assault,  he  succeeded  in  this  strange 
achievement,  and  having  informed  the  astonished  bystanders 
that  he  had  taken  the  enemy  prisoner,  announced  that  he 
should  give  him  no  quarter,  but  plunge  him  into  the  Red  Sea. 
The  manner  of  this  aquatic  ceremony  was  described  by  one 
of  the  witnesses,  Avho  endeavored  to  illustrate  it  by  his  gesture. 
After  uttering  various  cabalistic  words,  he  whirled  himself  in 
a  rapid  rotation,  with  his  arms  outstretched,  and  then,  suddenly 
pausing,  and  raising  himself  into  an  attitude  of  importance 
befitting  his  new  authority,  advanced  with  one  arm  a-kimbo, 


306  WEXFORD   ASSIZES. 

and  with  the  other  extended,  looking,  as  the  witness  expressed 
it,  "  as  if  he  held  the  devil  by  the  tail,"  and  marched  with  a 
measured  pace  and  a  mysterious  aspect,  to  a  bridge  upon  the 
river  Slaney,  where  he  buried  the  captive  demon  in  what  he 
took  for  the  Red  Sea. 

Not  contented  with  this  exploit,  he  exclaimed  that  Neill  had 
seven  more  devils,  which  he  was  determined  to  expel  from  this 
peculiar  object  of  diabolical  predilection.  The  operation  was 
accordingly  repeated  with  such  success,  that  Neill,  after  much 
strenuous  expostulation,  leaped  out  of  his  bed,  and  exclaimed 
that  he  was  quite  well.  This  circumstance  produced  a  deep 
impression  upon  the  crowd,  among  whom  there  were  some 
Protestants;  and  two  of  the  latter,  a  Mrs.  Winter  and  her 
daughter,  knelt  down,  and  called  upon  the  Lord  to  assist 
Father  Carroll  in  the  perpetration  of  the  next  miracle,  which, 
encouraged  by  their  pious  sympathies,  he  almost  immediately 
proceeded  to  commit.  A  poor  woman  happened  to  pass  along 
the  road,  whom  he  had  no  sooner  observed  than  he  knocked 
her  down,  and  pursued  a  mode  of  exorcism  similar  to  that 
which  I  have  described,  with  such  effect,  that  one  of  the  spec- 
tators cried  out  for  the  people  to  make  way,  "  as  he  saw  the 
devil  coming  out." 

This  achievement  only  served  to  excite  the  wretched  maniac, 
and  impel  him  to  another  undertaking  of  the  same  kind.  He 
insisted  "  that  the  devil  had  taken  possession  of  Sinot's  child." 
The  circumstances  which  I  have  detailed,  and  by  no  means 
endeavored  to  exaggerate,  would  be  merely  ridiculous  if  they 
were  not  the  result  of  a  malady  which  humbles  human  nature  ; 
the  incident  by  which  they  were  succeeded,  ought  to  make 
Democritus  shed  tears.  Sinot  had  a  child  who  had  been  af- 
fected by  fits,  and  over  whom  the  priest  had  been  requested 
by  its  mother  to  say  prayers.  This  was  not  only  a  natural, 
but,  I  will  add,  a  reasonable  application.  It  is  not  supposed 
by  Roman  Catholics  that  the  prayers  of  a  clergyman  are 
endowed  with  any  preternatural  efficacy;  but  it  is  considered 
that  praying  over  the  sick  is  a  pious  and  religious  act.  The 
recollection  of  this  fatal  request  passed  across  the  distempered 
mind  of  the  madman,  who  hurried  with  an  insane   alacrity  to 


father  cakroll's  trial.  307 

8inot's  cabin.  It  was  composed  of  two  rooms  upon  the  ground 
door,  in  the  smaller  of  which  lay  the  little  victim.  It  was 
indeed  so  contracted,  that  it  could  not  contain  more  than  two 
or  three  persons.  The  crowd  who  followed  the  priest  remained 
outside,  and  were  utterly  unconscious  of  what  he  was  about  to 
do.  The  father  of  the  child  was  not  in  the  house  when  Father 
Carroll  entered  it,  and  was  prevented  by  the  pressure  in  the 
exterior  room  from  approaching  him  ;  and  for  some  time  after 
the  death  of  the  child  was  wholly  unconscious  of  what  had 
taken  place. 

No  efforts  whatever  were  made  to  prevent  his  interference. 
He  was  produced  as  a  witness  upon  the  trial,  and  swore  that 
it  did  not  enter  into  his  thoughts  that  Father  Carroll  intended 
to  do  the  child  the  least  harm.  He  could  not,  he  said,  even 
see  the  priest.  It  is  not  necessary  to  describe  the  manner  of 
the  infant's  death.  It  is  enough  to  say  that,  after  uttering  a  few 
feeble  cries,  and  calling  upon  its  "  mammy,"  every  sound  be- 
came extinct.  The  madman  had  placed  the  child  under  a 
tub,  and  life  was  extinguished.  It  may  well  be  imagined  that 
the  trial  of  this  case  excited  a  strong  sensation  in  the  <£>unty 
where  the  rebellion  had  raged  with  its  most  dangerous  fury, 
and  from  which  it  will  be  long  before  its  recollections  will  have 
entirely  passed  away.  The  Protestant  party,  forgetting  that 
many  of  their  own  sect  had  taken  a  partial  share  in  the  pro- 
ceedings, of  which  they  had  been,  at  all  events,  the  passive 
witnesses,  exhibited  a  proud  and  disdainful  exultation,  and 
affected  a  deep  scorn  for  the  intellectual  debasement  of  which 
they  alleged  this  event  to  be  a  manifest  proof;  while  the 
Catholics  disclosed  a  festered  soreness  upon  an  incident  which, 
they  could  not  fail  to  feel,  was  likely  to  expose  them  to  much 
plausible  imputation. 

The  Court-house  was  crowded  to  the  roof  by  persons  of  all 
classes  and  opinions,  among  whom  the  clergy  of  both  churches 
were  conspicuous.  It  was  filled  with  parsons  and  with  priests. 
Although  there  is  a  certain  clerical  affinity  between  ecclesias- 
tics of  all  sorts,  it  was  not  difficult,  under  a  cloth  of  the  same 
•iolor,  to  distinguish  between  the  ministers  of  the  two  religions. 
&n  expression  of  sly  disdain,  accompanied  with  a  joyous  glit- 


308  WEXFORD    ASSIZES. 

ter  of  the  eye,  gleamed  over  tlie  parsons'  faces ;  while  the 
countenances  of  the  Catholic  clergy  betrayed,  in  the  rude  play 
of  their  marked  and  impassioned  features,  the  bitter  conscious- 
ness of  unmerited  humiliation. 

The  dress  of  the  two  clerical  parties  presented  a  singular 
contrast.  The  priests  were  cased  in  huge  top-boots  of  dubious 
and  murky  yellow  and  of  bespattered  black:  the  parsons' 
taper  limbs  were  enclosed  in  tight  and  sable  silk,  which,  by 
compressing,  disclosed  their  plump  proportions.  The  nameless 
integuments  of  the  Popish  ministers  of  the  gospel  were  framed 
of  substantial  thickset,  and  bore  evidence  to  the  high  trot  of 
the  rough-coated  nags  with  which  they  had  descended  from 
the  mountains  ;  while  the  immaculate  kerseymere  of  the  par- 
sons' inexpressibles  indicated  with  what  nicety  they  had 
picked  their  steps  through  all  the  mire  of  the  Catholic  mul- 
titude round  the  court.  The  priests'  dingy  waistcoats  were 
close  fastened  to  their  neckcloths,  and  looked  like  an  armor 
of  economy  ;  while  the  parsons'  exhibited  the  finest  cambric, 
wrought  into  minute  and  snow-white  folds.  A  ponderous 
mantle  of  smoking  frieze  hung  from  the  shoulders  of  the 
priest ;  while  a  well-shaped  jerkin  brought  the  parson's  sym- 
metries into  relief.  The  parson  held  a  pinch  of  Prince's  Mix- 
ture between  his  lilied  fingers,  while  the  priest  impelled  a 
reiterated  and  ample  mass  of  Lundifoot  into  his  olfactory 
organ*  The  priest's  cheek  was  ruddy  with  the  keen  air  of 
the  mountain  and  the  glen,  while  the  faint  blush  upon  the 
parson's  cheek  left  it  a  matter  for  conjecture,  whether  it  pro- 
ceeded from  some  remnant  of  nature,  or  was  the  result  of  the 
delicate  tincture  of  art.  The  former  sat  near  the  dock,  and  the 
latter  near  the  bench. 

*  Lundifoot  was  a  tobacconist  in  Dublin  who  made  a  large  fortune  by  a  snuff 
called  "Irish  Blackguard."  The  name  thus  originated:  one  of  the  workmen 
left  the  snuff  so  long  in  the  oven  that  it  became  "  high-dried."  Lundifoot,  de- 
tecting the  neglect,  scolded  the  man,  and  damned  him  for  an  Irish  blackguard. 
On  taking  out  the  snuff,  he  tried  a  pinch  of  it  (more  in  despair  than  hope),  dis- 
covered that  it  had  a  new  and  peculiar  flavor,  and  repeated  the  extra  drying 
on  a  large  scale.  The  snuff  took,  and  when  the  workman  was  desired  to  name 
It,  he  called  it  "Irish  Blackguard"  —  the  appellation  bestowed  on  himself. — 
Prince's  Mixture  is  a  dark,  moist,  scented  snuff,  much  affected  by  George  IVf? 
When  Prince  of  Wales.  —  M 


father  Carroll's  trial.  S09 

Besides  the  clergy  of  the  two  religions,  I  observed  another 
class,  whom,  from  their  plain  apparel  and  primitive  aspect,  I 
took  for  the  friars  of  Wexford,  but  upon  looking  more  closely 
I  discovered  my  mistake.  There  was  a  grimness  in  their  ex 
pression,  quite  foreign  from  the  natural  and  easy  cheerfulness 
of  an  Irish  Franciscan  ;  and  in  their  disastrous  and  Oalvinistic 
visages,  their  long,  lank  hair,  and  the  gloomy  leer  of  mingled 
hatred  and  derision  with  which  they  surveyed  the  Catholics 
around  them,  I  beheld  the  ghostly  "teachers  of  the  Word." 

A  pause  took  place  before  the  trial  was  called  on,  which 
rendered  expectation  more  intense :  at  length  Mr.  Justice 
Johnson  directed  that  the  prisoner  should  be  brought  forward. 
Every  eye  was  turned  to  the  dock,  and  the  prisoner  stood  at 
the  bar.  His  figure  was  tall  and  dignified.  A  large  black 
cloak  with  a  scarlet  collar  was  fastened  with  a  clasp  round, 
his  neck,  but  not  so  closely  as  to  conceal  the  ample  chest, 
across  which  his  arms  were  loosely  and  resignedly  folded. 
His  strong  black  hair  was  bound  with  a  velvet  band,  to  con- 
ceal the  recent  incisions  made  by  the  Surgeon  in  his  head. 
His  countenance  was  smooth  and  finely  chiseled ;  and  it  was 
observed  by  many  that  his  features,  which,  though  small,  were 
marked,  bore  a  miniature  resemblance  to  Napoleon.  His  color 
was  dead  and  chalky,  and  it  was  impossible  to  perceive  the 
least  play  or  variety  of  emotion  about  the  mouth,  which  con- 
tinued open,  and  of  the  color  of  ashes.  On  being  called  on  to 
plead,  he  remained  silent. 

The  Court  was  about  to  direct  an  inquiry  whether  he  was 
"  mute  of  malice,"  when  it  was  seen  by  a  glance  of  his  eye, 
that  he  was  conscious  of  the  purport  of  the  question ;  and  by 
the  directions  of  his  counsel  he  pleaded  not  guilty.  During 
the  trial,  which  was  conducted  with  the  most  exemplary  mod- 
eration by  the  counsel  for  the  crown,  he  retained  his  petrified 
and  statue-like  demeanor ;  and  although  the  heat  was  most 
intense,  the  hue  of  his  face  and  lips  did  not  undergo  the 
slightest  change.  The  jury  found  that  he  had  committed  the 
direful  act  under  the  influence  of  insanity.  Judge  Johnson 
addressed  him  in  a  very  striking  and  pathetic  manner.  He 
Beemed  to  me  to  have  blood  in  his  eye  for  Prince  Hohenloe, 


310  WEXFOUt)   ASSIZES. 

whose  miracles  Mere  then  in  vogue,*  and  were  supposed,  how- 
ever erroneously,  to  have  contributed  to  the  prisoner's  infatua- 
tion. This  was  a  mistake  :  he  was  organically  insane,  and 
was  in  reality  as  innocent  as  the  poor  child  who  had  perished 
in  his  hands.  The  learned  judge  opened  a  masqued  battery, 
upon  Bamberg,t  and  some  of  the  shots  reached  to  Rome  :  but 
lie  should  not  have  forgotten  that  there  is  a  form  for  exorcism 
in  the  Protestant  as  well  as  in  the  Roman  Catholic  ritual. 
The  religion  of  England  requires  a  further  cleansing,  and  a 
new  Reformation  might  be  a  judicious  project. 

*  Hohenloe  was  a  German  prince,  who  had  taken  holy  orders  in  the  Church 
of  Rome,  and  was  a  man  of  such  singular  piety  that  it  was  believed,  in  Ireland, 
from  1822  to  1825,  that  his  prayers,  if  offered  specially  in  any  particular  case, 
would  immediately  effect  a  cure  —  no  matter  how  severe  the  bodily  ailment  of 
the  person  prayed  for.  —  M. 

1  The  place,  in  Germany,  of  Prince  Hohenloe's  residence.— M 


JOHN   DOHERTY. 

Mr.  Doherty,  whom  Lis  personal  claims,  assisted  I  presume 
by  his  political  connections,  and  backed  by  the  opposition  ot 
Lord  Manners,  have  recommended  as  the  new  Solicitor  General 
of  Ireland  [1S27J,  is  six  feet  two  inches  high,  and  "  every  inch"  a 
very  estimable  person.  Tall  as  he  is,  there  is  nothing  contempt- 
nous  or  haughty  in  his  carriage.  He  never  proudly  tosses  up 
his  chin,  as  if  to  let  briefer  specimens  of  humanity  pass  under. 
He  delights  not,  like  his  learned  and  pious  competitor  for  office, 
in  soaring  among  the  skies  for  the  inward  satisfaction  of  look- 
ing down  upon  other  men  ;  neither  can  he  pass  with  the  dexter- 
ous versatility  of  that  holy  Sergeant  [LefroyJ  from  knotty  ques- 
tions of  Chancery  practice  to  the  latest  authorities  for  "  nonsuit- 
ing the  devil."*  He  is,  on  the  contrary,  as  terrestrial  as  can  be- 
in  his  habits  and  intercourse.  His  manners  are  friendly  and 
forbearing,  and  his  conversation  enlivened  by  a  temperate  love 
of  frolic,  which  endears  his  society  to  all  those  hardened  sin- 
ners who  have  not  yet  been  sainted  into  a  due  sense  of  the 
awful  responsibility  of  joining  in  a  hearty  laugh. 

As  to  more"  important  points,  he  is  admitted  on  all  hands  to 
be  an  extremely  clever  man.     He  is,  and  has  been  for  some 

*  An  English  writer  of  the  17th  century  has  sketched  "  the  character  of  a 
perfect  lawyer,"  from  which  I  extract  the  concluding  sentence  for  the  benefit 
of  the  learned  saints  of  Ireland.  "  In  a  word,  while  he  lives,  he  is  the  delight 
of  the  courts,  the  ornament  of  the  bar,  the  glory  of  his  profession,  the  patron 
of  innocency,  the  upholder  of  right,  the  scourge  of  oppression,  the  terror  of 
deceit,  and  the  oracle  of  his  country ;  and  when  death  calls  him  to  the  bar  of 
Heaven  by  a  habeas  corpus  cum  causis,  he  finds  his  judge  his  advocate,  nonsuits 
the  devil,  obtains  a  liberate  from  all  his  infirmities,  and  continues  still  one  of 
the  long  robe  in  glory." 


312  JOHN   DOHEIttT. 

years,  the  leader  upon  Lis  circuit;  and  since  lie  became  so, haft 
given  unequivocal  proofs  that  he  possesses  powers  of  no  ordi- 
nary kind  in  swaying  the  decisions  of  a  jury,  while  he  has 
more  recently,  in  the  discussion  of  graver  matters  in  the  courts 
of  Dublin,  established  a  character  for  legal  efficiency,  which 
has  been  erroneously  assumed  to  be  incompatible  with  the  more 
popular  attributes  of  wit  and  eloquence.  Resting  upon  a  con- 
fidence in  his  qualifications,  and  sustained  by  a  just  ambition, 
Mr.  Doherty  long  since  announced  by  his  conduct  that  he  as- 
pired to  something  more  than  the  partial  success  which  is 
founded  upon  the  mere  emoluments  of  place.  Five  years  ago 
he  resigned  a  lucrative  office,*  of  which  he  found  the  duties 
to  interfere  with  his  final  objects,  and,  dedicating  himself  more 
exclusively  to  his  profession,  has  prepared  himself  for  those 
higher  honors  which  he  then  predicted  to  lie  within  his  reach. 
As  an  advocate,  his  general  style  of  treating  serious  topics 
has  nothing  so  peculiarly  his  own  as  prominently  to  distinguish 
him  from  others.  In  his  addresses  to  juries  he  is  prompt,  or- 
derly, correct,  and  fluent  —  rarely  attempting  "to  inflame  the 
passions  to  their  highest  pitch,  but  always  warmly  and  forcibly 
inculcating  the  principles  of  common  sense  and  practical  good 
feeling;  but  when  a  case  requires  (in  technical  parlance)  "to 
be  laughed  out  of  court"  (and  one  half  of  the  cases  that  enter 
there  deserve  to  be  so  dismissed),  Mr.  Doherty  exhibits  powers 
of  very  striking  and  effective  originality.  I  know  of  no  one 
that  more  eminently  possesses  the  difficult  talent  of  enlisting  a 
jury  on  his  side  by  a  continued  strain  of  good-humored,  gen- 
tlemanlike irony  —  consisting  of  mock-heroic  encomiums,  sar- 
castic deference,  and  appropriate  parodies  upon  arguments  and 
illustrations,  delivered  (as  long  as  gravity  is  possible)  with  a 
most  meritorious  solemnity  of  countenance,  and  a  certain  artful 
kindliness  of  tone,  that  heightens  the  absurdity  it  exposes,  by 
affecting  to  commiserate  it.  He  is  also  distinguished  for  his 
ability  in  cross-examination  —  a  quality  which  has  rendered 
him,  in  his  capacity  of  crown-prosecutor  upon  his  circuit,  a  for- 
midable co-operator  in  the  enforcement  of  the  laws. 

*  Commissioner  of  Inquiry  into  Courts  of  Justice  in  Ireland  —  the    salary 
twelve  hundred  pounds  sterling  a  year.  —  M. 


candidates  fou  pnmoftoit.  313 

decent  events  have  brought  this  gentleman  into  prominent 
view  before  the  Irish  public,  and  have  arrayed  in  his  interest 
a  degree  of  popular  favor. which  is  rarely  tendered  to  a  future 
adviser  of  state-prosecutions.  Upon  the  late  vacancy  of  the 
Solicitor-Generalship  for  Ireland  (an  office  upon  which  its  long 
tenure  by  the  present  Lord  Chief- Justice  Bushe  Las  conferred 
a  kind  of  classic  dignity),  a  variety  of  concurring  circumstances 
—  the  respectability  of  his  personal  character  —  his  professional 
competency  —  the  known  liberality  of  his  political  opinions  — 
and  his  parliamentary  and  private  relations  with  the  prime 
minister  of  England  —  pointed  out  Mr.  Doherty  as  one  of  the 
fittest  persons  to  be  raised  to  the  situation. 

I  should  be  unjust  to  others  if  I  were  to  assert  that  he  was  in 
every  possible  respect  the  very  fittest.  I  can  not  overlook,  the 
Irish  public  did  not  overlook,  the  claims  of  such  a  man  as  Mr. 
Wallace,  founded  as  they  are  upon  eminent  professional  sta- 
tion, tried  public  character,  and  (the  penalty  of  the  latter)  a 
long  and  systematic  exclusion  from  office.  Mr.  Holmes  is  an- 
other.* He  was  spoken  of,  and  well  deserved  it.  His  profes- 
sional life  has  been  one  continued  manly  appeal  to  the  public ; 
and  the  public,  doing  all  they  could  for  him,  have  placed  him 
at  the  head  of  his  profession.  In  his  political  principles  he  has 
been  honest  and  immutable,  careless  of  patronage,  and  prizing 
above  all  things  his  self-respect.  Another  of  the  same  school 
and  stamp  is  Mr.  Perrin,  a  younger  man  by  many  years  —  too 
young,  perhaps,  to  be  raised  to  professional  honors  by  merit 
alone.t     His  name  was   not  mentioned  upon  the  occasion  re- 

*  Robert  Holmes,  for  many  years  Father  of  the  Irish  Bar,  made  his  last  pub- 
lic appearance  (of  any  consequence)  in  the  State  Trials  arising  out  of  the 
O'Connell  Monster  meeting's  of  1843,  holding-  a  brief  for  the  Crown.  He  was 
then  seventy-three  years  old.  He  was  a  lawyer  of  much  ability,  a  man  of  great 
private  worth.  He  .was  married  to  Emmett's  sister-in-law,  and,  on  suspicion 
of  holding  the  same  political  opinions,  was  arrested,  in  1803,  and  imprisoned 
for  some  months.  He  repeatedly  refused  a  silk  gown,  preferring  his  station  as 
a  plain  barrister  to  the  rank  of  King's  Counsel.  —  M. 

t  Louis  Perrin,  now  second  Judge   of  the   Queen's  Bench,  is  the   son  of  a 
teacher  of  languages  in  Dublin,  who  compiled  an  excellent  French  Dictionary 
His  family  came  to  Ireland,  to  avoid  persecution  in  France,  as  Huguenots.     The 
son,  born  in  1783,  and  called  to  the  bar  in  1806,  speedily  became  eminent  for 
his  knowledge  of  criminal  and  revenue  law.     At  Nisi  Prius  he  was  also  distin- 

Vol.  L  — 14  _ 


314  JOHN    DOHERTF. 

ferred  to,  but  where  a  fitness  for  the  public  service  is  in  ques- 
tion, I  can  not  in  fairness  pass  it  by.  He  commenced  his  career 
at  a  period  (the  most  dismal  in  the  annals  of  the  Irish  bar) 
when  public  spirit  led  to  martyrdom ;  but  he  was  one  of  the 
i'ew  that  were  too  strong  to  be  suppressed.  He  prospered  in 
despite  of  his  inflexible  adherence  to  the  opinions  of  his  youth, 
and  (a  rare  event  in  the  life  of  a  liberal  Irishman)  has  lived  to 
see  the  day  when  such  opinions  are  no  longer  to  disqualify.  I 
could  mention  others.  Mr.  North,  for  example,  was  in  every 
way  suited  by  character,  acquirements,  and  enlightened  views, 
to  bear  a  part  in  a  reformed  government  of  Ireland.  So  was 
Mr.  Crampton,*  who,  though  more  absorbed  in  his  profession, 

guislied,  and  had  a  calm,  earnest  manner  (the  result  of  his  somewhat  satur- 
nine temperament),  which  had  much  weight  with  juries.  Strongly  supported 
on  the  liberal  interest,  by  Lord  Anglesey's  Government,  Mr.  Perrin  contested 
the  representation  of  Dublin  city,  at  the  general  election,  in  1831,  and  was  re- 
turned with  Mr.  (afterward  Sir  Thomas)  Harty.  Both  were  soon  unseated  on 
petition.  At  the  election  in  1832,  following  the  passing  of  the  Reform  Bill, 
Mr.  Perrin  successfully  contested  Monaghan  County.  The  whigs  made  him 
Solicitor-General,  under  Attorney-General  O'Loghlin.  In  Parliament,  he  was 
an  industrious  man  who  carefully  attended  to  the  contents  and  revision  of  Irish 
Bills.  The  Whigs  placed  him  on  the  Bench,  and  he  has  there  given  general 
satisfaction.  In  the  O'Connell  trials  of  1844,  he  was  one  of  the  Judges — the 
others  being  Pennefather,  Burton,  and  Crampton.  During  these  State  Trials, 
he  did  not  conceal  nor  cloak  his  opinion  that  many  of  the  objections,  as  to  the 
legality  of  some  of  the  proceedings,  made  by  the  defendants  (O'Connell  and 
his  friends)  were  well  founded  —  but  he  was  overruled  by  the  majority.  Judge 
Perrin  has  always  been  a  consistent  liberal  in  politics.  Between  O'Connell 
and  himself  there  was  a  warm  friendship  of  long  standing.  He  is  now  [1854  j 
seventy  years  of  age. —  M. 

*  Charles  Cecil  Cranrpton,  born  in  1783,  was  called  to  the  bar  in  1810.  After 
a  veiy  distinguished  University  cai'eer,  he  first  became  Fellow  of,  and  subse- 
quently Law-Professor  to,  Trinity  College.  He  entered  Parliament  for  the 
borough  of  Dungarvan,  and  became  Solicitor-General  to  the  Whig  Government 
of  1830.  He  was  raised  to  the  Bench  earlier  than  usual,  owing  to  his  being 
disliked  by  Mr.  O'Connell,  who,  on  that  account,  could  not  work  pleasantly 
with  him.  The  Whigs,  who  then  ruled  Ireland  through  O'Connell,  made  Mr. 
Crampton  a  Judge,  on  the  earlie-ot  "acancy  —  to  get  him  cut  of  the  way.  Judge 
Crampton  never  was  an  eloquent  man,  but  it  is  supposed  mat  he  had  as  much 
Nisi-Prius  practice  as  any  Irish  lawyer,  in  his  time.  Long  before  the  Temper- 
ance Movement  had  been  commenced  by  Father  Matthew,  it  was  well  known 
that  Judge  Crampton  was  a  water-drinker.  When  he  became  so,  on  principle, 
he  proved   the  sincerity  of  his  profession,  by  starting  the  valuable  contents  of 


Lord  manners.  315 

and  more  circumspect  in  Lis  avowals,  lias  always  had  the  spirit 
to  keep  aloof  from  the  base  expedients  that  led  to  advance- 
ment at  the  Irish  bar. 

I  have  introduced  those  names  without  any  invidious  design 
toward  the  immediate  subject  of  the  present  sketch.  On  the 
contrary,  I  could  not  easily  produce  a  more  complimentary 
test  of  his  personal  and  professional  estimation  than  the  fact 
that  the  postponement  of  such  men  to  him  was  acquiesced  in 
without  a  murmur  from  the  bar  or  the  public.  His  individual 
qualifications  were  fully  admitted;  and  it  Avas  further  borne  in 
mind  that  the  circumstance  of  his  having  a  seat  in  the  House  of 
Commons,  where  one  at  the  least  of  the  law-officers  of  the  Crown 
should  be  present  to  answer  for  their  acts,  afforded  in  his  favor 
an  obvious  and  powerful  ground  of  preference.  The  Lord- 
Chancellor  of  Ireland,  however,  decided  otherwise;  and,  with- 
out presuming  to  usurp  the  jurisdiction  of  the  House  of  Peers, 
or  to  emulate  its  frequent  severity  toward  his  Lordship's  judi- 
cial errors,  I  may  perhaps  be  permitted  to  investigate  the  rea- 
sons and  the  value  of  his  decision  in  the  present  instance. 

Lord  Manners  is  a  nobleman  of  high  English  blood,  and  in 
his  individual  capacity,  and  when  left  to  himself,  is  marked 
by  all  the  thoroughbred  attributes  that  belong  to  his  race.  As 
a  private  man,  and  apart  from  politics,  he  is  dignified,  cour- 
teous, just,  and  generous.  His  moral  instincts  are  all  aided 
and  enforced  by  the  honorable  pride  of  the  peer  and  the  gen- 
tleman ;  he  recoils  from  Avhat  is  base,  not  only  because  it  is  so, 
but  because  to  act  otherwise  would  be  unworthy  of  the  blood 
of  the  Rutlands.  Though  of  a  temperament  rather  irritable 
than  warm,  he  is  fervid  and  steadfast  in  his  friendships.  In 
his  private  intercourse  there  is  an  easy  simplicity  of  manner, 
and  a  condescending  familiarity  of  tone,  that  not  only  fascinates 
his  immediate  adherents,  but  even  charms  down  the  resentment 
of  the  Catholic  Squire,  to  whom  he  explains  the  political  im- 
possibility of  granting  him  the  commission  of  the  peace.  Many 
of  these  qualities  follow  Lord  Manners  to  the  judgment-seat, 
but  in  company  with   others  which  greatly  detract  from  their 

his  wine-cellar  into  the  stream  which  flows  through  his  villa-demesne  in  the 
County  Wicldow.     Judge  Oampton  is  now  [1854]  seventy  years  of  age. —  M 


316  JO#N    DOttEMI?. 

influence.  It  is  not  so  easy  a  matter  to  be  a  great  judge  as  a 
perfect  gentleman.  That  lie  is  tlie  latter,  his  Lordship's  ene- 
mies must  admit ;  that  he  ever  could  be  the  former,  even  Ser- 
geant Lefroy  has  scrupulously  abstained  from  insinuating — 
the  contrary,  and  the  cause  of  it,  were  too  palpable. 

In  the  decisions  of  Lord  Manners,  even  in  those  now  pros- 
trate ones  at  which  the  Chancellor  of  England  shook  his  sides 
as  samples  of  provincial  equity,  there  were  no  symptoms  of 
impatient  or  perverted  strength  of  intellect  rushing  vigorously 
to  a  wrong  conclusion.  The  judicial  defects  of  Lord  Manners 
have  another  origin  —  a  natural  delicacy  of  mental  constitution, 
which  incapacitates  him  for  the  labors  of  legal  dialectics.  As 
far  as  a  mere  passive  operation  of  the  mind  is  required  for  col- 
lecting a  series  of  naked  facts,  he  shows  no  deficiency  of  per- 
ception or  retention.  The  settlements,  marriages,  deaths,  and 
incumbrances,  that  form  the  ordinary  staple  of  a  chancery  suit, 
he  can  master  with  sufficient  expertness;  and,  probably,  not 
the  less  so  from  having  his  attention  unmolested  during  the 
process  by  any  logical  speculations  upon  their  bearings  on  the 
issue ;  but  whenever  an  active  effort  of  thought  is  wanting  for 
the  comprehending  and  elucidating  a  complicated  question,  the 
organic  failing  of  his  mind  breaks  out.  Submit  two  proposi- 
tions to  him,  and,  if  they  be  in  immediate  juxtaposition,  he  can 
perceive  as  quickly  as  another  whether  they  correspond  or  dif- 
fer ;  but  if  (as  in  the  case  of  most  legal  problems)  their  relation 
is  discoverable  only  by  a  process  of  intermediate  comparisons, 
no  sooner  has  the  advocate  advanced  a  step  in  the  operation, 
than  he  is  left  to  proceed  alone,  the  Chancellor  remaining  stock 
still  at  the  starting-point,  and  looking  on  with  a  polite,  fastidi- 
ous smile,  as  if  he  were  rather  determined  not  to  be  misled  than 
unable  to  follow.  The  consequence  of  this  habitual  inertness 
of  intellect  is,  that  the  fate  of  every  case  of  difficulty  that  comes 
before  him  must  be  more  or  less  an  affair  of  chance,  depending 
not  so  much  upon  its  various  aspects,  as  upon  the  precise  point 
of  elevation  to  which  his  mind  can  be  possibly  uplifted  for  the 
purpose  of  inspection. 

Lord  Manners's  inaptitude  for  compound  reasoning  was  well 
known  to  Lord  Plunket,  who  would  often  practise  upon  it  with 


LORD- CHANCELLOR   HARDWICKE.  817 

the  unrelenting  dexterity  of  a  hardened  logician.  It  was  at 
once  interesting  and  amusing  to  see  that  consummate  advocate, 
when  nothing  else  remained,  resorting  to  a  series  of  subtle 
stratagems,  of  which  none  but  himself  could  discern  the  object, 
until  the  last  movement  being  completed,  presented  the  victim 
of  his  craft  pent  up  in  an  equitable  defile  from  which  there  was 
no  escaping.  If  he  attempted  it  on  one  side,  there  stood  Vesey 
Junior  guarding  the  pass;  if  on  the  other,  his  own  Stackpoole 
and  Stackpoole  (as  just  reversed  in  the  Lords')  stopped  the 
way ;  Hardwicke*  and  Camden  overawed  his  rear ;  common 
sense  and  the  Attorney-General  kept  annoying  his  front,  until 
the  keeper  of  the  Irish  seals,  exhausted  though  unconvinced, 
would  frankly  admit  that  he  was  "  perplexed  in  the  extreme," 
and,  casting  a  wistful  eye  at  Mr.  Sanrin,  demand  four-and- 
twenty  hours  to  clear  his  thoughts.  It  required,  however,  all 
the  authoritative  ability  of  such  a  man  as  the  late  Attorney- 
General  to  extract  such  an  admission  from  his  Lordship.  To 
others,  whom  there  was  less  risk  of  provoking  by  impatience, 

*  Philip  Yorke,  born  1690,  was  the  son  of  an  attorney  at  Dover.  Called  to 
the  bar  in  1714,  he  entered  Parliament  in  1718,  and  (though  the  youngest 
counsel  on  the  Western  Circuit)  was  appointed  Solicitor-General,  in  1720,  on 
the  recommendation  of  Lord  Chancellor  Macclesfield.  In  1723,  when  he  was 
made  Attorney-General,  he  refused  to  act  on  the  impeachment  of  Lord  Maccles- 
field, his  first  patron,  and  defended  him,  in  the  House  of  Commons  from  the 
attacks  of  Mr.  Sergeant  Pengelly.  In  1733,  was  made  Lord  Chief-Justice  of 
England,  and  raised  to  the  peerage,  as  Baron  Hardwicke.  He  was  appointed 
Lord  Chancellor  in  1737,  and  during  the  twenty  years  he  held  that  office,  only 
three  of  his  judgments  were  even  questioned,  and  these  were  confirmed,  or. 
appeal,  by  the  House  of  Lords.  In  1754  he  was  raised  to  an  Earldom,  and 
resigned  office  in  1756.  He  died  in  1764,  leaving  a  reputation  very  high  in- 
deed. H:3  knowledge  of  law  and  equity  was  great.  So  were  his  learning  and 
his  ready  application  of  it.  Lord  Mansfield,  Burke,  and  the  noted  John  Wilkes, 
each  characterized  him  in  the  same  words  — "  When  Hardwicke  pronounced 
his  decrees,  Wisdom  herself  might  be  supposed  to  speak."  He  trifled  with 
literature,  which  he  liked.  He  wrote  "  The  Legal  Judicature  in  Chancery 
stated,"  and,  when  only  two-and-twenty,sent  Addison  a  paper,  on  the  disad- 
vantage of  young  men  going  abroad  too  early :  it  has  the  signature  Philip 
Homebred,  and  forms  No.  364  of  The  Spectator.  Sending  a  present  of  a  hare, 
he  despatched  the  following  epigram  with  it : — 

"  Mitto  tibi  leporcm  ;  gratos  milri  mitte  lepores  ; 
Sal  mea  commendat  muncra,  vestra  sales." — M, 


318  JOHN   DOHERTY. 

he  has  always  given  it  to  be  clearly  understood  that,  when  once 
he  had  succeeded  in  forming  an  opinion,  he  did  not  expect  to 
be  pressed  by  arguments  against  it.  In  doing  this  he  did  not 
intend  to  be  unjust;  he  merely  shrunk  from  the  mental  labor 
of  reinvestigating  the  grounds  of  a  conclusion,  at  which,  whether 
right  or  wrong,  he  had  found  it  no  easy  task  to  arrive  :  but  the 
consequence  of  his  known  irritability  upon  such  occasions  has 
inevitably  been  to  place  a  counsel  in  the  embarrassing  predica- 
ment of  either  surrendering  his  case  before  it  is  thoroughly  dis- 
cussed, or  of  exposing  himself  by  his  perseverance  to  the  im- 
putation of  being  wanting  in  respect  to  the  Court. 

A  Chancellor  of  Ireland  is  necessarily  a  politician,  and  I 
confidently  believe  that  Lord  Manners  had  as  anxious  a  wish 
to  be  a  beneficent  statesman  as  to  be  a  just  judge,  but  it  could 
not  be.  He  came  to  Ireland  with  the  prejudices  of  the  cradle 
upon  the  questions  that  agitate  her;  and  in  a  mind  like  his, 
such  prejudices  are  fondly  cherished  as  easy  of  comprehension, 
and  saving  the  necessity  of  more  laborious  investigation.  Tell 
this  amiable  nobleman  that  the  dread  of  Popery  is  no  more 
the  foundation  of  British  freedom  than  the  fear  of  goblins  is 
the  basis  of  religion,  and  he  starts  as  if  you  proposed  an  im- 
mediate dissolution  of  society.  Insinuate  that  the  only  known 
method  of  consolidating  an  empire  is  by  communicating  equal 
rights  and  benefits  to  all  its  parts,  and  his  prophetic  eye  be- 
holds a  picture  inconceivably  appalling — the  Pope  on  the 
throne  of  Ireland  ;  Doctor  Doyle,  Archbishop  of  Dublin;*  Mr. 
O'Connell,  Lord  High-Chancellor;  Mr.  Purcel  O'Gorman,  prin- 
cipal Secretary  for  Papal  affairs ;  and,  worse  than  all,  Mr. 
Bheil  sworn  in  as  Solicitor-General  before  he  was  actually  more 
than  twenty  years  at  the  bar ! 

This  chronic  distemper  of  the  mind  has  influenced  almost 

*  The  Reverend  James  Doyle,  D.  D.,  Roman  Catholic  Bishop  of  Kildare 
and  LeighHn,  was  a  very  eminent  writer  on  polemics  and  politics.  His  exam- 
ination, in  1825,  on  the  State  of  Ireland,  taken  before  a  Committee  of  the 
House  of  Lords,  was  full  of  sound  information,  and  excited  general  admiration. 
His  writings  chiefly  appeared  with  the  signature  J.  K.  L. — the  initials  of  his 
own  Christian  name  and  that  of  his  diocese >  Of  Bishop  Doyle  a  further  no- 
tice will  be  found  on  page  382. —  M. 


LOED  MANNEEs's    COMPANIONS.  319 

all  Lord  Manners's  political  acts  :  his  government  of  the  magis- 
tracy, his  recommendations  to  office,  and  (what  in  Ireland  may 
he  called  a  political  a*Ct)  the  selection  of  his  personal  favorites. 
Even  the  speculators  in  a  preposterous  theology,  which  Lord 
Manners  never  liked,  found  favor  in  his  sight,  in  consideration 
of  their  rapturous  concurrence  in  his  worldly  misconceptions. 
He  was  at  all  times  willing  to  meet  a  senior  or  junior  saint 
anywhere  but  at  the  Bethesda,  and  to  hear  anything  from  their 
lips  except  an  extemporaiy  exhortation.  It  was  quite  impossible 
that  a  person  so  single-hearted  and  unsuspecting  should  fail 
to  be  the  frequent  dupe  of  those  intelligent  devotees.  It  is 
recorded  of  that  ingenious  personage,  immortalized  as  Mr.  Dex- 
ter in  the  novel  of  "  O'Donnell,"  that  he  was  in  the  habit,  for 
his  own  shrewd  purposes,  of  keeping  close  to  the  Irish  Chan- 
cellor (who  is  a  keen  sportsman,  though  an  indifferent  shot), 
upon  his  shooting  excursions  through  Lord  Abercorn's  grounds. 
Every  bird  that  rose  was  missed  by  the  peer,  and  contempora- 
neously brought  down  by  his  unerring  companion,  who,  with 
pretended  mortification,  and  an  effrontery  of  adulation  known 
only  to  Irish  parasites,  would  bluster  about  the  unfairness  of 
being  anticipated  in  every  shot;  and,  after  a  day  thus  turned 
to  good  account,  would  bring  back  the  illustrious  sportsman 
loaded  with  imaginary  spoils,  and  exulting  in  his  undiminished 
accuracy  of  aim.  It  was  not  only  in  the  fields  of  Barons  Court 
that  his  Lordship  has  been  attended  by  men  as  dexterous  as 
Mr.  Dexter.  He  was  too  obvious  an  instrument  not  to  be  sur- 
rounded by  practised  political  marksmen,  who  were  ever  ready, 
for  their  own  substantial  objects,  to  give  him  all  the  use  and 
glory  of  their  skill.  Having  no  taste  for  general  reading  or 
solitary  meditation,  he  has  dedicated  his  extra-judicial  hours 
to  social  ease,  and  naturally  fell  into  a  companionship  with 
those  who  were  least  disposed  to  shake  his  faith  in  his  preju- 
dices. It  was  not  in  the  Huguenot  recollections  of  Mr.  Sail- 
rin,  nor  in  the  colloquial  revelations  of  Mr.  Sergeant  Lefroy, 
that  a  public  functionary  in  Ireland  could  be  expected  to  be 
weaned  of  his  political  antipathies.  The  extent  of  those  an- 
tipathies, and  their  undeviating  influence  upon  his  Lordship's 
publk   acts,  may  be  collected  from  a  single  fact.     Among  thf* 


320  JOHN  DOHERTY. 

legal  appointments  in  the  gift  of  the  Irish  Chancellor,  there  are 
about  thirty  commission erships  of  bankrupts;  and,  during  the 
twenty  years  that  Lord  Manners  has  keld  the  seals,  not  one 
Catholic  barrister  has  been  named  to  a  place. 

An  important  branch  of  the  Irish  Chancellor's  patronage, 
and  one  that  he  has  exercised  with  more  profusion  than  any 
of  his  predecessors,  is  the  nomination  of  King's  Counsel.  The 
subject  demands  a  short  notice  of  the  nature  and  incidents  of 
this  appointment.  The  legal  fiction  is  (as  the  term  imports), 
that  a  certain  number  of  barristers  are  selected  to  conduct  the 
necessary  business  of  the  Crown.  In  point  of  fact  they  are 
utterly  unnecessary,  and,  as  such,  unemployed  for  that  pur- 
pose. The  business  of  the  Crown  can  be,  and  is,  fully  dis- 
charged by  the  Attorney  and  Solicitor  General  and  the  three 
Sergeants  upon  important  occasions  ;  and,  in  ordinary  matters, 
by  the  several  Crown-prosecutors,  who  are  chosen  indiscrimi- 
nately from  the  bar.  The  Attorney-General  is  bound  to  pro- 
vide for  the  proper  conduct  of  Crown-prosecutions,  and,  as  he 
can  not  be  present  in  his  own  person,  he  substitutes  in  his  place 
certain  individuals,  for  whose  efficiency  he  is  responsible;  of 
these  a  considerable  portion,  upon  some  of  the  circuits  one  half, 
are  at  this  moment  stuff  gowns.  But  however  rarely  the  King 
may  in  point  of  fact  have  occasion  for  the  services  of  his  nomi- 
nal counsel,  they  are  by  a  similar  fiction  of  law  presumed  to  be 
at  all  times  occupied  with  the  business  of  the  Crown,  and  there- 
fore entitled  to  precedence  in  the  Courts.  This,  to  a  barrister 
of  ordinary  efficiency,  is  an  important  personal  advantage.  It 
enables  him  to  bring  on  his  motions  to  a  speedy  decision,  and 
thus  establishes,  for  those  who  enjoy  the  privilege,  a  profitable 
monopoly  of  an  extensive  branch  of  general  business.  The 
only  exception  is  in  the  Rolls  Court;  where,  by  a  regulation 
of  the  present  Master  of  the  Rolls,  the  several  motions  for  the 
day  are  entered  in  a  list  according  to  the  date  of  the  notice, 
and  called  on  in  regular  rotation.  There  is,  consequently,  no 
precedency  among  the  counsel;  and  the  result  (which  can 
be  scarcely  accidental)  is,  that  in  that  Court  the  great  mass  of 
the  very  important  business  transacted  there  is  distributed 
among  the  membev«  of  the  outer  bar.     In  all  the  other  Courts 


OBJECTIONS    TO   HIS    PROMOTION.  321 

a  large  portion  of  the  general  business  is  withdrawn  from  the 
outer  bar,  and  distributed  among  the  privileged  few.  In  com- 
mon fairness,  therefore,  to  the  profession  at  large,  and  also  to 
the  suitor,  who  ought  to  be  left  as  uncontrolled  as  possible  in 
the  selection  of  his  counsel,  personal  privileges  of  this  kind, 
which  thus  work  a  detriment  to  others,  should  be  very  spar- 
ingly conferred.  In  former  times,  a  silk-gown  was  given  as  an 
honorary  distinction  to  an  already  eminent  barrister,  and  not 
as  a  recommendation  to  business.  Thirty  years  ago  there  were 
only  sixteen  King's  Counsel,  and  since  then  the  general  busi- 
ness of  the  bar  has  materially  decreased.  There  are  now 
forty-three  —  all,  with  a  few  exceptions,  of  Lord  Manners's 
creation.  The  number  has,  in  fact,  become  so  excessive,  that 
it  has  been  found  necessary  to  alter  the  old  arrangement  of  the 
Courts,  in  order  to  supply  them  all  with  seats.  At  the  English 
bar,  where  public  opinion  has  some  influence,  there  were,  at  the 
commencement  of  the  present  year  [1827],  only  twenty-eight 
King's  Counsel. 

When  Mr.  Doherty  was  lately  nominated  to  the  vacant  So- 
licitor-Generalship for  Ireland,  Lord  Manners  interposed,  and 
for  some  weeks  refused  to  swear  him  in.  The  measure  was  as 
unprecedented  as  the  reason  assigned ;  namely,  that  the  gen- 
tleman in  question,  who  is  of  twenty  years'  standing,  was  too 
youthful  a  barrister  to  be  lifted  over  the  heads  of  certain  meri- 
torious seniors.  The  principle  sounded  fairly  enough  in  the 
ears  of  the  one  or  two  who  hoped  to  profit  by  it,  but  it  had  not 
the  slightest  foundation  in  established  usage.  There  has  been 
no  such  thing  at  the  Irish  bar  as  even  a  vague  expectation  that 
promotion  was  to  be  regulated  by  length  of  standing,  and  least 
of  all,  promotion  to  the  office  in  question,  which  may  be  said 
to  partake  more  of  a  political  than  a  legal  character.  It  is  only 
necessary  to  refer  to  the  appointments  since  the  Union ;  they 
are  as  follows  : — 

Sir  John  Stewart,  eighteen  years  at  the  bar. 

Mr.  O'Grady  (now  Chief  Baron  of  the  Exchequer),  fifteen 
years  at  the  bar. 

Mr.  M'Cleland  (now  Baron  of  the  Exchequer),  thirteen  years 
at  the  bar. 

H* 


322  JOHN    DOHKRTY. 

Mr.  Plunket  (now  Chief-Justice  of  the  Common  Pleas),  sev- 
enteen years  at  the  bar. 

Mr.  Bushe  (now  Chief-Justice  of  the  King's  Bench),  thirteen 
years  at  the  bar. 

The  list  closes  with  the  present  Attorney-General,  Mr.  Joy 
[1827].  He  had  certainly  obtained  the  maturity  of  standing, 
which  has  at  length  been  discovered  to  be  so  indispensable  a 
qualification ;  but  who,  that  ever  gave  a  thought  to  the  reasons 
for  Ms  appointment,  does  not  know  that  he  was  made  Solicitor- 
General  in  1822,  not  because  he  happened  to  be  a  Sergeant, 
not  because  he  was  well  stricken  in  legal  years,  but  because  there 
was  in  his  person  a  coincidence  of  professional  and  political 
requisites  which  accorded  with  the  project  of  a  balanced  Ad- 
ministration. So  far  as  the  question  of  seniority  is  concerned, 
he  formed  an  exception  to  the  general  practice. 

Overlooking,  however,  the  objection  that  Mr.  Doherty  is  not 
old  enough  in  his  profession  to  be  a  "promising  young  man" 
—  a  grave  legal  maxim,  for  which  Lord  Manners  has  the  high 
authority  of  Mr.  Sergeant  Flower — I  would  say  that  the  po- 
litical circumstances  of  Ireland  afford  some  very  serious  reasons 
for  the  selection  of  this  gentleman,  and  the  rejection  of  the 
class  of  competitors  that  Lord  Manners  would  have  preferred. 
The  late  purification  of  the  British  Cabinet*  has  opened  new 

*  George  Canning  was  appointed  Governor-General  of  India  in  1822,  had 
prepared  for  his  departure,  and  publicly  taken  leave  of  his  constituents  at  Liv- 
erpool, when  the  Marquis  of  Londonderry  (Castlereagh)  committed  suicide. 
The  foreign  secretaryship  thus  became  vacant.  George  IV.  (who  had  not  for- 
given him  for  going  to  the  Continent,  and  offering  to  resign  his  office  of  Presi- 
dent of  the  Board  of  Control,  rather  than  assist  in  the  prosecution  and  persecu- 
tion of  Queen  Caroline,  whom  he  had  spoken  of  in  Parliament  as  "  the 
grace,  life,  and  ornament  of  society")  hesitated  to  appoint  Canning.  He  did 
so,  however,  and  Canning  thereby  became  the  virtual  head  of  the  Administration, 
the  nominal  head  being  Lord  Liverpool,  who  was  obliged  to  take  large  and 
daily  doses  of  ether  to  strengthen  his  nerves,  and  who  confessed  that,  for  years, 
he  had  never  received  his  letters  in  the  morning  without  dreading  to  open 
them,  for  fear  that  they  should  give  him  notice  of  an  insurrection  in  some  part 
of  the  country.  Croly  (a  Tory)  says  of  him  that  his  system  was  to  glide  on  from 
year  to  year,  and  think  that  his  business  was  amply  done,  if  the  twelve  months 
passed  without  a  rebellion,  a  war,  or  a  national  bankruptcy;  to  shrink  from 
every  improvement  in  his  terror  of  change ;  and  to  tolerate  every  old  abuse, 
through  dread  of  giving  the  nation  a  habit  of  inquiry.     Yet  this  man  had  ruled 


canning's  government.  323 

prospects  to  the  Catholics  of  Ireland,  and  (what  a  wise  and 
considerate  government  should  never  overlook)  has  inspired 
their  leaders  with  a  sanguine  and  determined  forbearance  sel- 

England,  with  a  mind  thus  enfeebled,  for  fifteen  years  !  From  1822  until  Feb- 
ruary, 1827,  when  Lord  Liverpool  was  attacked  by  paralysis,  Canning  may  be 
aaid  to  have  ruled  the  country.  Some  weeks  elapsed  before  Lord  Liverpool's 
place  was  filled  up  —  in  the  interval  (early  in  March),  Canning  made  a  power- 
ful speech  in  Parliament,  in  support  of  Catholic  Emancipation,  which  was  lost 
by  a  majority  of  four  only.  At  last,  on  April  12,  1827,  it  was  announced  that 
Canning  had  been  appointed  Prime  Minister.  Suddenly  and  simultaneously, 
Wellington,  Peel,  Eldon,  and  three  others  of  Canning's  colleagues  in  the  Cab- 
inet, resigned.  He  fox-med  a  ministry  consisting  of  liberals  —  but  the  Tories 
formed  a  compact  opposition,  aided  by  "  the  old  whigs,"  headed  by  Earl  Grey. 
This  latter  party,  not  very  numerous  then,  consisted  of  those  who  thought  that 
certain  noble  families,  on  either  side,  had  a  sort  of  hereditary  right  to  govern 
the  country.  Perhaps,  also,  Lord  Grey  recollected  that,  in  a  keen  satire  on 
"  All  the  Talents,"  written  by  Canning,  twenty  years  before,  Temple's  wit  and 
Sidmouth's- firmness,  had  been  slily  contrasted  with 

"  the  temper  of  Grey, 

And  Treasurer  Sheridan's  promise  to  pay." 

At  all  events,  Lord  Grey  strongly  and  haughtily  opposed  Canning's  ministry. 
The  Irish  Catholics,  who  saw  in  the  new  Premier  one  of  their  most  eloquent  ad- 
vocates, and  who  speedily  felt  the  advantages  accruing  from  the  charges  he 
made  personnalite  of  the  Irish  Government,  naturally  entertained  the  highest 
hopes  from  the  promotion  of  their  friend.  He  had  to  contend,  in  ill  health,  with 
a  very  strong  and  ruthless  opposition  in  Parliament  which  "  hounded  him  on  to 
death"  (to  use  the  words  of  Lord  George  Bentlnck's  accusation  of  Peel,  at  a 
later  day),  and  a  Pi'emier  who  would  have  carried  out  the  most  liberal  meas- 
ures, had  he  lived,  died  in  the  Duke  of  Devonshire's  house,  at  Chiswick,  near 
London,  on  August  8,  1827,  aged  57,  in  the  very  same  room  where,  twenty-ono 
years'  earlier,  Charles  James  Fox  had  breathed  his  last  —  much  about  the  same 
age ;  each  being  liberal  in  politics,  each  crowning  the  labors  of  a  life  of  active 
ambition,  by  finally  obtaining  the  highest  office  —  to  hold  it  for  a  few  months 
and  "  die  in  harness."  Canning  was  succeeded,  as  Premier,  by  Lord  Gode- 
rich,  who  had  not  talent  or  influence  to  govern.  In  January,  1828,  the  reins 
of  empire  passed  from  his  weak  hands  to  those  of  Wellington  —  the  avowed 
opponent  of  the  Catholic  claims.  Then,  in  despair  and  defiance,  came  the  Clare 
Election,  which  led,  in  the  Duke's  opinion,  to  one  of  two  things  —  a  civil  war 
or  Catholic  Emancipation.  The.  soldier,  sagacious  by  reason  of  his  long  expe- 
rience in  war,  preferred  to  yield — on  the  plea  of  necessity.  This  he  did  in 
1829.  Next  year,  he  was  too  proud  to  grant  Parliamentary  Reform,  on  the  same 
grounds,  and  was  defeated.  The  Whigs  came  into  power,  headed  by  Lord 
Grey,  and  after  the  severest  Parliamentary  struggle  ever  known — stretching 
through  two  Parliaments  and  two  years'  excitement  —  was  passed  that  reform 


324  JOHN    DOHERTY. 

dom  manifested  by  the  directors  of  a  popular  body.  The  skill 
and  prudence  with  which  Mr.  O'Connell  and  his  colleagues,  at 
the  risk  of  their  popularity,  have  prevailed  upon  their  ardent 
countrymen  to  accommodate  their  temper  to  the  exigencies  of 
the  occasion,  justly  merited  every  practical  acknowledgment 
that  could  be  tendered  by  the  new  Administration.  Next  to 
the  final  consummation  of  their  hopes,  the  Irish  Catholics  an- 
nex the  utmost  importance  to  the  official  appointments  of  per- 
sons in  whom  they  can  confide ;  and  most  of  all  in  the  case  of 
the  legal  advisers  of  the  Crown,  upon  whose  individual  charac- 
ters and  political  tenets  they  know  by  experience  that  the 
decision  of  many  questions  affecting  their  interests  depends. 

But,  however  sensitive  upon  this  point,  they  evinced  no  dis- 
position, at  the  recent  crisis,  to  embarrass  the  Government,  by 
exacting  more  than  could  be  conveniently  accorded.  Though 
well  aware  of  Mr.  Joy's  hostility  to  their  cause,  they  allowed 
his  personal  claims  to  outweigh  their  wishes,  and  acquiesced, 
as  a  matter  of  state  necessity,  in  his  elevation  to  the  vacant 
Attorney-Generalship ;  but  farther  than  this  they  could  not  be 
expected  to  go.  They  saw  that  the  Government  was  free  to 
choose  his  colleague,  and  very  reasonably  considered  that  their 
feelings  and  interests  should  be  consulted  in  the  selection. 
Had  this  expectation  been  baffled  —  had  a  political  favorite  of 
Lord  Manners  been  raised  to  a  condition  of  suggesting  subtle 
reasons  for  disturbing  the  public  tranquillity  by  the  prosecution 
of  the  Catholic  leaders,  the  most,  disastrous  results  would  have 
ensued  ;  all  confidence  in  the  professions  of  the  new  Minister 
would  have  been  at  an  end.  The  Catholic  Association  would 
have  instantly  exploded,  and  have  been  quickly  involved  in 
angry  collisions  with  the  Government,  fatal  alike  to  their  own 
interests  and  to  the  stability  of  the  Administration  from  which 
they  have  so  much  to  hope.  These  lamentable  consequences 
have,  however,  been  prevented.  The  spirit  of  a  better  and 
juster  policy  prevailed.  Mr.  Doherty  was  preferred;  and  the 
measure  was  no  sooner  announced,  than  its  propriety  was  sanc- 

in  the  parliamentary  representation  of  the  people,  which  now  [1854]  is  to  be 
extended,  on  the  ground  of  the  incompleteness  of  the  previous  measure  of 
1832. — M. 


tttClDENlS   OF   flIS   PUBLIC   LIFE.  325 

tioiied  by  tbe  public  and  unequivocal  satisfaction  of  that  body 
which  it  was  of  such  vital  moment  to  conciliate.* 

The  mere  legal  duties  of  the  office  to  which  Mr.  Doherty 
has  been  called  might  be  easily  discharged  by  a  person  of  pro- 
fessional qualifications  much  inferior  to  his ;  but  it  embraces 
other  duties,  demanding  requisites  of  another  and  less  common 
kind.  It  is  now  notorious  that  the  Catholic  question  (however 
opinions  may  vary  upon  its  relative  importance)  is  the  one 
upon  which  the  fate  of  administrations  depends,  and  most  pe- 
culiarly the  fate  of  the  present  administration.  The  Catholics 
of  Ireland,  though  not  yet  arrived  at  the  maturity  of  strength 
and  influence  in  the  empire  which,  when  attained,  must  insure 
an  adjustment  of  their  claims,  have  it  at  all  times  in  their  power 
to  resort  to  proceedings  incompatible  with  the  continuance  of 
their  friends  in  office.  Hence  the  relation  of  that  body  with 
the  Government  of  the  country,  at  the  present  juncture,  is  one 

*  John  Doherty,  who  was  Chief-Justice  of  the  Common  Pleas  in  Ireland,  for 
twenty  years,  was  called  to  the  bar  in  1808,  made  King's  Counsel  in  1823 
Solicitor-General  in  1827,  and  was  Chief-Justice  from  1830  until  September, 
1850,  when  he  died.  Doherty,  related  on  the  maternal  side  to  Colonel  Vemer, 
M.  P,  for  Armagh,  and  by  his  father's  family  to  Canning,  came  into  Parlia- 
ment in  1826,  as  Member  for  Kilkenny.  When  Canning  became  Premier,  he 
raised  Doherty  to  the  position  of  Irish  Solicitor.  His  knowledge  of  the  science  of 
law  was  by  no  means  extensive,  but  his  sagacity  was  great,  his  industry  exem 
plary,  and  his  sense  of  Justice  pre-eminently  powerful.  It  is  said  that  of  all 
the  opponents  who  measured  weapons  with  O'Connell  in  Parliament,  the  most 
successful,  and  certainly  one  of  the  most  undaunted,  was  Mr.  Doherty.  Their 
chief  encounter  took  place  in  May,  1830,  shortly  before  Doherty  was  made  a 
Judge,  and  O'Connell  fiercely  attacked  him  for  his  conduct  as  Crown  lawyer, 
in  what  was  called  The  Doneraile  Conspiracy.  He  was  met  and  answered,  at 
all  points,  by  Doherty,  who  (in  the  opinion  of  the  Anti-O'Connellites,  at  least), 
silenced,  if  he  did  not  convince,  his  assailant.  Peel  had  such  a  favorable  rec- 
ollection of  this  word-duel  that,  in  1834,  when  he  formed  his  first  ministry, 
he  solicited  Doherty  to  resign  his  judicial  office,  and  to  return  to  the  House  of 
Commons,  as  one  of  the  Cabinet.  This  was  declined,  whereupon  Peel  repeat- 
ed his  entreaty,  offering  to  raise  him  to  the  House  of  Lords.  Chief-Justice 
Doherty  again  declined,  and  Peel  struggled  on  without  his  aid  during  the  four 
months  of  his  bold  experiment  of  governing  against  the  popular  will.  In  1846, 
before  finally  quitting  office,  it  is  said  that  Peel  -again  offered  a  peerage  to 
Doherty,  who  was  compelled  to  decline  it,  from  want  of  means  to  provide  for 
the  support  of  the  dignity,  having  entered  lai'gely  into  railway  speculations, 
(lining  the  preceding  joint-sto  k-bubble  year,  and  thereby  lost  the  bulk  of  his 
fortune. —  M. 


320  Jonh   DOHERTY. 

of  unexampled  delicacy;  and  as  such  requires  the  nicest  man- 
agement in  sustaining  them  under  the  fatigues  of  protracted 
hope,  and  in  preventing  them  from  confounding  inevitable  de- 
lays with  an  abandonment  of  their  cause  by  their  professed  sup- 
porters. It  would  be  too  much  to  expect  that  indications  of 
this  latter  feeling  will  not  occasionally  break  out,  and  in  forms 
that  may  render  it  doubtful  whether  the  due  limits  of  popular 
discussion  have  been  observed.  Upon  such  questions,  when 
they  arise,  the  law-officers  of  the  Crown  will  have  to  advise ; 
and,  to  advise  with  discretion,  they  must  have  something  more 
than  a  knowledge  of  the  law.  There  must  be  good  temper, 
good  sense,  good  will  toward  the  parties  concerned,  and  a 
strong  public  interest  in  preserving  the  state  from  the  embar- 
rassments that  would  follow  a  hasty  prosecution.  These  im- 
portant moral  qualifications  (if  he  be  true  to  the  tenor  of  his 
past  life)  will  be  found  in  Mr.  Doherty's  official  character;  and 
along  with  them  a  great  practical  skill  in  winning  over  the 
tempers  of  others  to  a  given  object,  which  eminently  fits  him 
for  the  task  of  mediating  between  the  occasional  effervescence 
of  his  Catholic  countrymen  and  the  literal  rigor  of  the  law. 
He  will  also  —  but  I  have  pursued  the  subject  far  enough* and 
in  dwelling  so  long  upon  it  I  feel  it  to  be  only  an  act  of  com- 
mon justice  to  an  estimable  individual  to  record  the  opinion  of 
the  Irish  public  upon  the  cruel  but  unavailing  attempt  that  has 
been  made  to  mar  his  prospects,  and  to  bring  discredit  upon 
the  Government  that  thought  him  worthy  of  their  trust. 

The  voice  of  the  country  in  which  Mr.  Doherty  is  best  known 
has  sustained  him  through  this  important  crisis  of  his  life.  The 
zeal  with  which  his  case  was  taken  up  by  the  Irish  community, 
though  a  merited,  was  a  most  essential  service,  and  claims  at 
his  hands  every  possible  public  return  that  he  can  make.  He 
may  personally  forgive  the  Irish  Chancellor  for  the  wrong  in- 
flicted on  him  ;  but  for  the  sake  of  others,  if  not  for  his  own,  he 
must  bear  it  keenly  in  his  memory,  and,  stimulated  by  the  rec- 
ollection, make  his  future  conduct  a  practical  refutation  of  the 
pretexts  for  crushing  him,  and  thereby  afford  an  unanswerable 
justification  of  the  Government  that  placed  him  where  he  is, 
and  of  the  public  that  so  warmly  approved  of  the  choice* 


IN    PARLIAMENT.  32? 

What  is  expected  from  him  as  an  officer  of  the  Crown  I  have 
already  intimated;  but  he  will  have  other  and  more  compre- 
hensive opportunities  of  retorting  upon  Lord  Manners  his  pub- 
lic services.  He  will  shortly  resume  his  seat  in  the  House  of 
Commons,  under  circumstances  that  will  secure  for  him  an 
effective  co-operation  in  every  salutary  measure  that  he  pro- 
poses;  and  he  must  not  allow  the  indolence  of  success,  or  a 
groundless  diffidence,  to  restrain  him  from  turning  his  facilities 
to  a  useful  account.  Hitherto  he  has  prudently  abstained  from 
trusting  his  reputation  to  the  precarious  effect  of  sample- 
speeches;  and  his  continued  abstinence  will  be  justly  applaud- 
ed, if  he  aspires  to  the  better  fame  of  making  the  statute-book 
speak  for  him. 

I  have  heard  that  he  has  for  some  time  past  been  meditating 
a  simplification  of  the  Irish  bankrupt-law.  This  is  a  favorable 
omen ;  but  his  ambition,  to  be  of  service,  must  not  be  limited 
to  matters  of  subordinate  moment.  It  would  be  neither  easy 
nor  in  place  to  enumerate  here  the  various  legislative  wants  of 
Ireland ;  but  I  can  not  avoid  suggesting  that  there  is  one  sub- 
ject of  the  highest  national  interest  as  yet  unappropriated  by 
any  Irish  member,  and  holding  out  an  asssurance  of  the  lasting 
importance  that  follows  public  services  to  any  competent  indi- 
vidual who  shall  make  it  his  peculiar  care  :  I  allude  to  the 
civilization  of  the  Irish  criminal  code.  Such  a  project  would 
be  immediately  within  the  scope  of  Mr.  Doherty's  studies  and 
experience ;  much  of  the  first  and  most  deterring  labor  of  the 
task  would  be  saved  by  the  adoption  of  Mr.  Peel's  general 
plan,*  while  enough  would  remain  in  the  modifications  required 
by  the  particular  state  of  Irish  society,  to  give  the  undertaking 
a  higher  character  than  that  of  a  servile  imitation. 

*  The  late  Sir  Robert  Peel  was  an  eminently  practical  man  of  business.  In 
1817,  when  he  was  Irish  Secretary,  he  introduced  the  excellent  police  system 
now  in  operation  in  Ireland  —  from  him  the  policemen  are  called  Peelers.  Thir- 
teen years  later,  he  modified  that  system  and  adapted  it  to  London,  where  it 
continues  to  be  very  efficient.  In  1826,  he  commenced  his  admirable  attempts 
to  soften  the  rigor  of  our  cinminal  code,  and  succeeded  in  mitigating  the  sever- 
ity of  laws,  which,  in  consequence  of  their  harshness,  had  become  neai'ly  inop- 
erative. Nor,  when  he  quitted  office,  in  1827  (on  Canning's  becoming  Pre« 
mier),  did  he  relinquish  this  course  of  humanity  and  reason. —  M. 


THE    DUBLIN    TABINET   BALL. 

A  large  district  of  Dublin,  commonly  called  "  The  Lib- 
erty," is  occupied  by  the  manufacturers  of  tabinet.  This  part 
of  the  city  exhibits  at  all  times  a  disagreeable  aspect.  It  is 
a  labyrinth  of  narrow  lanes,  composed  of  old  and  crazy 
houses,  and  is  choked  with  nastiness  of  every  kind.  Even 
when  its  enormous  population  is  in  active  employment,  the 
senses  are  shocked  with  much  odious  circumstance  ;  but  when 
labor  is  suspended,  as  is  often  the  case,  and  the  inhabitants  are 
thrown  out  of  employment,  a  spectacle  of  wretchedness  is  pre- 
sented in  this  quarter  of  the  Irish  metropolis,  of  which  it  would 
require  the  genius  of  Mr.  Orabbe  for  the  delineation  of  misery 
to  convey  any  adequate  picture. 

In  the  last  month  the  manufacturing  class  have  been  with- 
out occupation  or  food.  I  passed,  not  very  many  days  ago, 
through  the  district  in  which  they  chiefly  reside,  and  do  not 
recollect  to  have  ever  witnessed  a  more  distressing  scene.  The 
streets  may  be  said  to  have  swarmed  with  want.  With  star- 
vation and  despair  in  their  countenances,  and  with  their  arms 
hanging  in  listlessness  at  their  sides,  hundreds  of  emaciated 
men  stood  in  groups  at  every  corner.  They  gaped  on  every 
person  of  the  better  class  who  chanced  to  pas3  them,  with  the 
vacant  earnestness  of  famine  ;  and  when  the  equipage  of  some 
pampered  and  vain-glorious  citizen  rolled  by,  it  was  painful 
to  observe  in  the  expression  of  their  faces  the  dumb  compari- 
son with  their  own  condition,  which  was  passing  through  their 
minds. 

The  doors  of  the  houses  lay  wide  open,  and,  lighted  up  as 
they  were  with  the  new  and  brilliant  sunshine  of  May,  afforded 


CASTLE   PATRONAGE.  320 

an  insight  into  the  recesses  of  internal  wretchedness.  Their 
wives  and  children  were  seen  huddled  np  together,  Avith 
scarcely  a  shred  of  raiment  upon  their  discolored  and  ema- 
ciated limbs.  Their  beds  and  blankets  had  been  transferred 
to  the  pawnbrokers ;  and  of  their  furniture,  nothing  but  the 
mere  fixtures  remained.  The  ashes  round  the  hearth  seemed 
to  be  of  a  week's  standing;  and  it  was  easy  to  perceive  that  the 
few  potato-skins,  scattered  about  the  floor,  were  the  relics  of  a 
repast  of  no  very  recent  date.  Silence  in  general  prevailed 
through  these  receptacles  of  calamity,  except  that  now  and 
then  I  heard  the  Availing  of  a  child,  who  called  with  a  feeble 
cry  for  bread.  Most  of  these  houses  of  affliction  were  deserted 
by  the  men,  who  stood  in  frightful  gatherings  in  the  public 
way.  But  here  and  there  I  observed  the  wan  but  athletic 
father  of  a  family,  sitting  in  the  interior  of  his  hovel,  with  his 
hands  locked  upon  his  knee,  surrounded  by  his  children,  of 
whose  presence  he  appeared  to  be  scarcely  conscious,  and  with 
his  wild  and  matted  hair,  his  fixed  and  maddening  eye,  his 
hard  and  stony  lip,  exhibiting  a  personification  of  despair; 
and,  if  I  may  so  say,  looking  like  the  Ugolino  of  "The 
Liberty." 

Whatever  may  be  the  faults  of  the  Irish  character,  insensi- 
bility to  distress  is  not  among  them.  Much  substantial  and 
practical  commiseration  was  exhibited  among  the  higher 
orders  for  the  sufferings  of  the  unfortunate  manufacturers, 
and  various  expedients  were  adopted  for  their  relief.  It 
wag,  among  other  devices  of  benevolence,  suggested  to  the 
Marchioness  of  Wellesley,  that  a  public  ball  at  the  Rotunda 
would  be  of  use,  and  accordingly  a  "  Tabinet  Ball,"  under  the 
auspices  of  that  fair  and  newly-ennobled  lady,  was  announced. 
The  notice  was  given  in  order  to  afford  the  young  ladies  in 
the  country  an  opportunity  of  coming  to  town,  and  the  1-1  til 
of  May  [1826]  was  fixed  for  the  metropolitan  fete.  Peremptory 
orders  were  issued  at  the  Oastle,  that  no  person  should  appear 
in  any  other  than  Irish  manufacture.  A  great  sensation  was 
produced  by  what  in  such  a  provincial  town  as  Dublin  may 
be  considered  as  an  event.  Crowds  of  families  flocked  from 
all  parta  of  the  country  ;  and  if  any  prudential  grazier  remoii' 


330  DUBLIN   TABINET   BALL. 

strated  against  the  expense  of  a  journey  to  the  metropolis,  the 
eyes  of  the  young  ladies  having  duly  filled  with  tears,  and 
mamma  having  protested  that  Mr.  O'Flaherty  might  as  well 
send  the  girls  to  a  convent,  and  doom  them  to  old-maidenhood 
for  life,  the  old  carriage  was  ordered  to  the  hall-door,  and 
came  creaking  into  town,  laden  with  the  rural  belles,  who 
were  to  make  a  conquest  at  the  "  Tabinet  Ball."  The  arrival 
of  the  important  day  was  looked  for  with  impatience,  and 
many  a  young  heart  was  kept  beating  under  its  virgin  zone 
at  the  pleasurable  anticipation.  In  the  interval  much  good 
was  accomplished,  and  Terpsichore  set  the  loom  at  work. 
Every  milliner's  shop  gave  notes  of  profuse  and  prodigal  prep- 
aration. 

At  last  the  11th  of  May  arrived,  and  at  about  ten  o'clock 
the  city  shook  with  the  roll  of  carriages  hurrying  from  all 
quarters  to  the  Rotunda.  Not  very  long  ago,  Doctor  Brinkley, 
the  astronomer,*  took  the  noise  of  a  newly-established  manu- 
factory for  the  indication  of  an  approaching  earthquake  ;  and 
if  he  had  not  been  removed  since  then  from  the  contemplation 
of  the  stars,  he  Avould,  in  all  likelihood,  have  taken  the  con- 
cussion of  the  Tabinet  Ball  night,  for  the  earthquake  itself, 
The  love  of  dancing  is  not  among  my  addictions,  and  it  is  the 
tendency  of  most  persons  of  my  profession  to  set  up  as  a  kind 
of  spurious  Ohilde-Harolds  upon  occasions  of  this  kind ;  but 
as  the  object  of  the  ball  was  national,  and  I  was  solicitous  to 
take  a  close  survey  of  Lord  Wellesley  and  his  Transatlantic 
bride,  I  resolved  to  join  the  festive  gathering,  which  charity 
and  its  amiable  patroness  had  assembled. 

The  Rotunda,  where  the  ball  was  given,  is  a  very  beautiful 
building,  erected,  I  believe,  by  Sir  William  Ohambers,t  and 

*  Dr.  John  Brinkley  was  an  Englishman,  born  in  1760.  He  was  educated 
at  Oxford,  and  was  appointed,  on  the  repute  he  had  gained  for  his  scientific 
acquirements,  to  the  Professorship  of  Astronomy  in  the  University  of  Dublin. 
He  remained  in  this  office  until  he  was  made  Bishop  of  Cloyne.  He  died  in 
1835.     He  was  the  discoverer,  in  1814,  of  the  parallax  of  the  fixed  stars. —  M. 

t  Sir  William  Chambers,  architect,  was  a  native  of  Scotland,  and  erected 
Somerset  House,  in  London,  a  palatial  edifice  of  much  beauty,  appropriated  to 
offices  for  several  of  the  Government  departments.  He  wrote  a  valuable  work 
on  "  Civil  Architecture,"  and  died  in  1796.     He  was  knighted  by  the  King  of 


THE   IUISH   LADIES.  331 

18  one  of  those  models  of  pure  architecture  with  which  Dublin 
abounds.  Upon  entering  it,  how  different  was  the  scene  from 
that  with  which  it  was  associated,  and  how  strong-  a  contrast 
was  presented  between  the  gorgeous  and  glittering  spectacle 
before  me,  and  that  which  I  have  endeavored  to  describe. 
My  mind  still  retained  some  of  those  mournful  reflections 
which  the  contemplation  of  misery  had  produced  ;  and  when 
I  found  myself  surrounded  with  a  blaze  of  intense  and  brilliant 
illumination,  and  encompassed  by  a  crowd  glittering  with 
splendor,  youth,  and  beauty,  and  moving  in  measure  to  exhil- 
arating music,  the  naked  and  half-famished  wretches,  whom 
I  had  seen  so  recently,  rose  like  phantoms  in  my  memory,  and 
my  imagination  went  back  to  the  abode  of  starvation,  and  to 
"  the  house  of  wo."  I  did  not,  however,  permit  these  melan- 
choly reflections  to  lay  any  permanent  hold  upon  me;  and  in- 
deed the  recollection  that  pleasure  was  made  in  this  instance  to 
minister  to  the  relief  of  sorrow,  should  have  reconciled  a  per- 
son of  a  much  more  ascetic  quality  of  mind  than  I  am,  to  a 
participation  of  the  enjoyments  of  so  brilliant  a  scene. 

I  question  whether  in  London  itself,  however  it  may  surpass 
our  metropolis  in  wealth  and  grandeur,  more  splendor  in  alli- 
ance with  good  taste  could  readily  be  displayed.  There  was 
an  immense  assemblage  of  young  and  beautiful  women,  dressed 
in  an  attire  which,  instead  of  impairing,  tended  to  set  off  the 
loveliness  of  their  aspects,  and  the  symmetry  of  their  fine 
forms — that  sweetness  and  innocency  of  expression  which 
characterizes  an   Irish   lady,  sat  upon    their  faces  ;   modesty, 

Sweden.  —  Under  the  present  regulations,  no  British  subject  can  receive  or  as- 
sume any  title  conferred  by  a  foreigner,  nor  wear  the  insignia  of  any  foreign 
Order,  without  special  permission  from  his  own  sovereign.  Foreign  titles  have 
been  conferred  upon  several  British  subjects.  Jobn  Duke  of  Marlborough  was 
made  a  Prince  of  the  Holy  Roman  Empire  by  the  Emperor  of  Germany;  Nel 
son  was  created  Duke  of  Bronte,  in  Sicily,  with  the  grant  of  an  estate,  by  the 
King  of  Naples;  Wellington,  was  made  Duke  of  Ciudad  Rodrigo,  with  an  es- 
tate, by  the  Junta  of  Spain,  and  Duke  of  Victoria  by  the  Regent  of  Portugal, 
as  well  as  Prince  of  Waterloo,  by  the  King  of  the  Netherlands  ;  and  Sir  Charles 
Napier,  for  bis  naval  services  in  restoring  Queen  Donna  Maria  to  the  throne 
of  Portugal,  was  made  Count  Cape  St.  Vincent',  by  Don  Pedro,  having  pre- 
viously received  a  title  from  the  King  of  the  Two  Sicilies,  for  his  gallant  cap- 
ture of  the  Isle  of  Ponza. —  M. 


332  DUBLIN   TABtttET  BALL. 

kindness,  and  vivacity,  played  in  their  features;  and  grace 
and  joyousness  swayed  the  movement  of  limbs  which  Chan- 
trey  would  not  disdain  to  select,  for  a  model.*  While  I  was 
looking  upon  this  fine  spectacle  with  some  feeling  of  national 
pride,  it  was  announced  that  Lord  Wellesley  and  the  Mar- 
chioness were  about  to  enter  the  room.  There  was  a  sudden 
cessation  in  the  dancing,  and  the  light  airs  to  which  the  crowd 
had  been  moving  were  exchanged  for  the  Royal  Anthem.  I 
had  never  observed  the  Marquis  so  nearly  as  to  form  a  very 
accurate  notion  of  him,  and  his  beautiful  American  I  had 
never  seen.  I  felt  a  strong  curiosity  about  her.  A  Yankee, 
and  a  Papist,  turned  into  a  Vice-Queen  !  !  There  was  some- 
thing strange  in  this  caprice  of  fortune,  and  I  was  anxious  to 
see  the  person  with  whom  the  blind  goddess  had  played  so 
fantastic  a  freak.f 

*  Francis  Chantrey,  one  of  the  most  celebrated  of  modem  English  sculp- 
tors, and  certainly  without  a  superior  as  a  bust-maker,  was  born  in  1781,  and 
died  in  1841,  aged  sixty.  From  childhood  he  had  a  taste  for  drawing  and 
modelling,  and  after  serving  his  time  to  a  carver  and  gilder  at  Sheffield,  there 
commenced  painting  portraits,  which  he  soon  gave  up  for  making  busts.  One 
of  these,  in  the  exhibition  of  the  Royal  Academy  in  London,  brought  him  into 
notice.  He  removed  to  London  and  speedily  obtained  numerous  orders.  His 
busts  were  portraits  in  marble,  full  of  character  and  individuality.  In  1817,  he 
executed  the  monumental  group  of  "  The  Sleeping  Children"  now  in  Lich- 
field Cathedral,  over  whose  simple  beauty  and  touching  repose  many  tears  have 
been  shed.  This  poetic  group  was  made,  it  is  said,  from  a  drawing  by  Stoth- 
ard.  Chantrey,  who  was  elected  a  Royal  Academician,  and  knighted,  executed 
the  busts  of  nearly  all  the  leading  personages  of  his  time,  and  several  colossal 
statues,  in  bronze,  as  public  monuments.  Of  these,  perhaps  the  most  familiar, 
which  was  also  the  last  (and  not  erected  until  after  he  had  died),  was  the  Wel- 
lington equestrian  statue  in  front  of  the  Royal  Exchange,  London. —  M. 

t  The  present  Marchioness  Wellesley,  was  Marianne,  daughter  of  Richard 
Cat.on,  Esq.,  of  Maryland,  and  widow  of  Robert  Patterson.  The  marriage  took 
place  in  February,  1825,  when  Lord  Wellesley  was  in  his  sixty-fifth,  and  the 
biide  in  her  thirty-first  year.  Her  sister,  Louisa  Catherine  Caton  was  mar- 
ried in  1817,  to  Sir  Felton  Bathurst  Harvey,  became  a  widow  in  1819,  and 
was  married  in  1828,  to  the  present  Duke  of  Leeds,  then  Marquis  of  Carmar- 
then. The  Marquis  Wellesley's  first  wife,  to  whom  he  was  married  in  1794, 
was  Hyacinthe  Gabriel,  daughter  of  Mons.  Roland.  She  died  in  1816.  She 
had  lived  with  the  Marquis  before  marriage,  and  had  two  daughters  then,  but 
no  legitimate  issue.  One  of  these  daughters,  married  in  1812  to  Mr.  Littleton 
(now  Lord  Hathevton),  was  small  in  person,  admirable  in  shape,  charming  in 


AN   AMERICAN    VICE-QUEEN.  333 

The  Marchioness's  name  is  Caton  :  she  is  the  widow  of 
Mr.  Patterson,  find  is  thus  allied,  in  some  degree,  with  the 
Bonaparte  family.  She  came  to  Ireland,  accompanied  by  her 
sister,  with  no  other  object  than  to  see  the  country.  Having 
been  introduced  to  the  most  fashionable  circles,  she  did  not  at 
first  disclose  her  religion,  which  might  have  been  an  obstacle 
to  the  cordiality  of  her  reception.  Her  addiction  to  Popery 
was  little  suspected,  as  may  be  judged  from  her  having  been 
selected  by  Mr.  Saurin  as  his  political  confidante.  It  was  at 
a  party  at  his  house  (so,  at  least,  it  is  rumored  in  Dublin) 
that  she  first  revealed  her  leanings  toward  the  Pope.  The 
learned  gentleman,  whose  spleen  to  the  religion  of  the  coun- 
try, considering  his  Huguenot  descent  and  his  fall  from  office, 
ought  to  be  forgiven,  had  indulged  in  violent  tirades  against 
Lord  Wellesley ;  upon  which  the  amiable  widow  did  not  hint 
a  comment;  and  he  came  to  an  attack  upon  Popery,  although 
some  symptoms  of  uneasiness  were  displayed,  yet  for  a  long 
time  no  remonstrance  was  made.  Mr.  Saurin  was  not  inter- 
rupted in  his  fleers  at  transubstantiation ;  he  was  permitted  to 
indulge  in  some  pleasantries  at  the  expense  of  auricular  con- 
fession :  certain  interesting  anecdotes  touching  the  Borgia 
family  were  allowed  to  pass ;  but  when  he  came  to  Prince 
Hohenloe,  and  opened  a  battery  upon  Bamberg,  the  widow 
could  hold  no  longer;  and,  turning  upon  Mr.  Ex-Attorney- 
General,  proclaimed  herself  a  Papist.  The  dismay  produced 
by  this  intimation  may  be  more  readily  conjectured  than 
described.  Whether  a  slight  flush  came  over  the  calm  and 
corrugated  countenance  of  the  host  has  not  been  stated  in  the 
common  report  of  this  agreeable  incident;  but  it  is  said  that 
the  fair  American  volunteered  her  interposition  with  Prince 
Hohenloe,  on  behalf  of  her  friend,  in  order  to  procure  his 
restoration  to  office,  having  observed,  by  way  of  parenthesis, 
that  nothing  less  than  a  miracle  could  accomplish  so  appa- 
rently improbable  an  event. 

manner,  intellectual  in  conversation,  and  so  beautiful  in  face  that  the  Emperor 
Alexander,  of  Russia,  who  saw  her  (on  his  visit  to  England,  in  1814,  with  the 
rest  of  the  Allied  Sovereigns),  declared  that  she  was  the  loveliest  human  being 
eyes  had  ever  looked  at  and  been  dazzled  by.  Lady  Hatherton  died  in  Janu- 
ary, 1849.  — M. 


334  DUBLIN   TABINET   BALL. 

Not  very  long  after  this  convivial  incident,  Mrs.  Patterson 
was  introduced  at  court,  and  Lord  Wellesley  was  almost 
instantaneously  struck  with  admiration  of  charms,  of  which 
one  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  pounds  were  said  to  constitute 
a  part.*  Her  wealth  was,  however,  greatly  exaggerated  by 
vulgar  report;  and  the  Marquis  is,  I  believe,  the  very  last 
man  who  would  be  disposed  to  take  it  into  a  matrimonial  cal- 
culation. Though  Hymen  is  sometimes  addicted  to  the  study 
of  arithmetic,  yet  Lord  Wellesley  would  never  set  him  this 
inglorious  task.  He  offered  Mrs.  Patterson  his  hand,  and  was 
accepted.  In  such  a  town  as  Dublin,  so  provincial  in  every- 
thing, and  more  especially  in  religion,  the  marriage  of  a  lord- 
lieutenant  to  a  Roman  Catholic  lady  excited  no  ordinary 
sensation.  The  Catholics  conceived  that  their  creed  would 
receive  a  sanction  from  a  pair  of  beautiful  eyes  at  the  Castle ; 
the  priests  expected  that  she  would  drive  in  state  to  chapel ; 
and  Messrs.  O'Connell  and  Sheil  did  not  despair  that  her  love 
of  legitimate  rhetoric  might  induce  her  to  go  in  disguise  to  the 
gallery  of  the  Catholic  House  of  Commons.  The  hopes  of 
the  Popish  party  were  not  a  little  confirmed  by  the  nomina- 
tion of  her  private  chaplain,  in  the  person  of  the  good-humored 
and  cheerful-spirited  Mr.  Glynn.  The  Orange  faction,  and 
especially  the  saints,  looked  on  the  approaching  event  with  a 
sentiment  of  corresponding  alarm.  It  was  idle,  they  said,  to 
expect,  on  the  part  of  Lord  Wellesley,  any  very  rigid  adhe- 
rence to  the  principles  of  the  Protestant  religion.  How  pow- 
erful must  be  the  influence  of  a  young  and  a  beautiful  wife 
upon  a  man  of  careless  or  vacillating  opinions. 

These  apprehensions  were  not  a  little  augmented  by  the 
announcement  that  the  Catholic  archbishop  was  to  celebrate 

*  There  are  many  reasons  for  believing  that  the"  lady"  though  rich  in  personal 
charms,  and  moderately  independent  in  circumstances,  was  by  no  means  Bit 
wealthy  as  was  reported.  Her  present  pecuniary  resources  are  understood  to 
be  inconsiderable.  I  am  in  doubt  whether  she  does  not  receive  a  pension  from 
the  British  Government  or  the  East  India  Company  (both  of  whom  Marquis 
Wellesley  had  served  faithfully  and  with  distinction),  but  I  know  that  Queen 
Victoria  has  granted  her  a  residence  in  Hampton  Court  Palace,  a  "  refuge  for 
the  destitute"  among  the  aristocracy,  in  which  many  pauperized  people  of  rank 
are  ^ent-free.  —  M. 


THE   VICEROY   AND    HIS    BRIDE.  £35 

the  marriage.  Lord  Wellesley  Avas  anxious  to  indulge  liis 
bride  in  this  selection ;  but  Dr.  Magee  and  his  partisans  pre- 
vailed. It  was  settled  that  the  Doctor  should  have  prece- 
dence ;  and  that,  after  he  had  "  incorporated  two  in  one,"  the 
rival  hierarch  should  be  introduced  by  a  postern  gate,  and 
allay  the  Marchioness's  religious  scruples  by  a  sacramental 
confirmation  of  the  nugatory  formalities,  which  should  have 
been  previously  gone  through  by  the  Protestant  divine.  By 
this  arrangement,  politics  and  theology  were  felicitously  recon- 
ciled. Dr.  Magee  went  through  the  ceremony  with  his  usual 
briskness  and  alacrity ;  and  so  sweet  and  winning  was  the 
smile  with  which  the  lady  responded  to  the  matrimonial  pre- 
cept— to  love,  honor,  and  obey — that  the  doctor  is  said  to 
have  protested  that  Gospel  truth  shone  through  her  eyes. 
Such  is  the  fascination  of  beauty,  even  upon  a  mind  so  highly 
spiritualized  as  the  doctor's,  that,  since  this  heterodox  mar- 
riage, a  considerable  and  even  suspicious  mitigation  of  his 
opinions  has  been  observed.  The  influence  of  the  Marchioness 
is  matter  of  universal  comment ;  and,  upon  a  recent  occasion, 
it  was  remarked  that  the  Right  Reverend  Father  in  God  had 
acted  as  cicisbeo  to  this  "  dangerous  Papist,"  and  had  accom- 
panied her  to  the  principal  mart  for  the  sale  of  baby-linen  in 
Dublin. 

These  circumstances  had  surrounded  the  Marchioness  Avith 
much  interest,  and  will  account  for  the  curiosity  which  I 
felt  to  see  her.  I  stood  in  no  little  suspense,  when  it  was 
announced  that  the  noble  pair  were  making  their  triumphant 
entry  into  the  Rotunda.  Followed  by  a  gorgeous  retinue  of 
richly-decorated  attendants,  the  Viceroy  and  his  consort  ad- 
vanced toward  the  immense  assembly,  who  received  them  with 
acclamation.  She  was  leaning  upon  his  arm.  He  seemed 
justly  proud  of  so  fair  a  burden.  The  consciousness  of  so 
noble  a  possession  had  the  effect  upon  him  which  the  inspira- 
tions of  Genius  were  said  to  have  produced  upon  a  celebrated 
actor,  and  he  looked  "  six  feet  high,"  compact  and  well  knit 
together,  with  great  alertness  in  his  movements,  and  Avith  no 
further  stoop  than  sixty  winters  have  left  upon  him,  with  a 
searching  and  finely-irradiated  eye,  and  with  cheeks  which, 


336  DUBLIN  TABINET  BALL. 

however  furrowed,  carry  but  few  traces  of  the  tropics.  The 
victor  of  Tippoo  Saib,  and  the  conqueror  of  Captain  Rock, 
entered  the  Rotunda*  I  am  not  quite  sure  that  there  was  not 
a  slight  touch  of  melo-dramatic  importance  in  his  air  and  man- 

*  In  1821,  when  George  IV.  visited  Ireland  —  the  first  sovei'eign  who  had 
ever  landed  on  her  shore,  in  friendly  mood  —  all  parties  united  in  giving  him 
an  enthusiastic  reception.  This  unanimity  of  "  loyalty"  (as  the  lip-service  is 
called,  across  the  Atlantic),  was  in  strong  contrast  with  the  hooting  and  hisses 
with  which,  at  that  time,  the  "  illustrious"  Sybarite  was  greeted  in  London,  on 
account  of  his  ill-conduct  toward  his  wife.  He  was  as  grateful  for  this  kindness 
(as  unmerited  as  it  was  unexpected),  and  assented  to  the  politic  proposition 
of  his  Ministers  that  Ireland  should  be  treated  more  kindly  than  of  yore.  When 
he  left  Dublin,  he  earnestly  recommended  the  Irish  (in  a  farewell  epistle  com- 
municated through  Lord  Sidmouth,  the  Home  Secretary),  no  longer  to  allow 
their  religious  distinctions  to  be  the  cause  of  public  animosity,  or  personal  bit- 
terness.—  Soon  after,  the  Tory  Viceroy,  Earl  Talbot,  was  recalled,  and  Marquis 
Wellesley,  a  distinguished  Irishman,  elder  brother  of  the  Duke  of  Wellington, 
and  a  proved  advocate  of  the  Catholic  claims,  was  sent  to  Dublin  as  his  succes- 
sor, in  December,  1821.  The  Catholics  rejoiced  at  his  appointment  as  much 
as  the  political-Protestants  grieved.  He  endeavored  to  govern  with  impartial- 
ity, but  could  not  please  all  parties.  In  1828,  when  the  Duke  of  Wellington 
became  Premier,  and  was  avowedly  hostile  to  Catholic  Emancipation,  Lord  Wei 
lesley  resigned  his  post,  but  resumed  it,  in  1833,  under  the  liberal  Government 
of  Earl  Grey.  He  finally  quitted  Ireland,  at  the  end  of  1834,  on  the  forma- 
tion of  Sir  Robert  Peel's  first  administration.  The  chief  fault  of  Lord  Welles- 
ley,  as  Viceroy,  was  an  overweening  opinion  of  his  own  importance.  What 
the  Bourbon  said  (Vetat  Jest  moi)  was  Lord  Wellesley's  entire  conviction.  He 
was  born  in  1760  ;  educated  at  Eton  ;  succeeded  his  father,  as  Earl  of  Moming- 
ton,  in  1781 ;  sat  in  the  Irish  House  of  Lords,  and  in  the  English  House  of 
Commons  (first  as  member  for  Beeralston  and  then  for  New  Windsor)  ;  was 
made  one  of  the  Lords  of  the  Treasury,  and  Privy  Councillor  in  1793,  and  cre- 
ated an  English  peer  in  1797,  when  he  succeeded  Earl  Cornwallis  in  the  Gov- 
ernment of  India ;  triumphed  over  Tippoo  Saib  and  conquered  the  kingdom  of 
Mysore,  with  the  aid  of  his  brother  Colonel  Wellesley  (afterward  The  Duke); 
was  rewarded  by  an  Irish  Marquisate  in  1799  ;  was  recalled,  at  his  own  request, 
in  1805;  was  sent  as  Ambassador  to  the  Supreme  Junta  of  Spain  in  1809; 
became  Foreign  Secretary  on  the  formation  of  the  Perceval  Ministry  in  tho 
same  year;  retired  early  in  1812,  chiefly  because  he  differed  from  his  colleagues 
on  the  Catholic  question ;  and  continued  in  opposition  until  his  appointment  to 
Ireland  in  1821.  In  1835,  he  was  Lord  Chamberlain,  under  the  Melbourne 
Ministry,  for  a  short  time.  He  died  in  September,  1842,  in  his  eighty-third 
year.  His  mother,  who  died  in  1831,  lived  to  see  four  of  her  sons  attain  seats 
in  the  House  of  Lords,  solely  by  their  merits,  and  as  rev/a,  rdj  of  public  ser- 
vices ,—M 


MOCKERY   OF   STATE.  337 

ner ;  and,  with  a  good  deal  of  genuine  dignity,  it  occurred  to 
me  that  there  was  something  artificial  and  theatrical  in  his 
entrance  upon  a  stage,  in  which  ephemeral  majesty  was  to  be 
performed.  It  was  said  by  Voltaire  of  a  real  monarch,  that 
no  man  could  so  well  perform  the  part  of  a  king.  "  Le  Role 
de  Roi,"  is  a  phrase  which,  amounting  to  a  truism,  loses  its 
force,  perhaps,  when  applied  to  a  lord-lieutenant. 

Lord  Wellesley  seemed  to  me  to  personate  his  sovereign 
with  too  elaborate  a  fidelity  to  the  part,  and  to  forget  that  he 
was  not  in  permanent  possession  of  the  character  upon  a  stage 
which  was  under  the  direction  of  such  capricious  managers, 
and  that  he  must  speedily  relinquish  it  to  some  other  actor 
upon  our  provincial  boards.  He  is,  unquestionably,  a  man  of 
very  great  abilities ;  a  speaker  of  the  first  order ;  a  statesman 
with  wide  and  philosophic  views,  who  does  not  bound  his  pros 
pects  by  any  artificial  horizon.  He  has  great  fame  as  a  poli- 
tician, and  has  the  merit  of  having  co-operated  with  Mr. 
O'Oonnell  in  the  pacification  of  Ireland. 

With  these  intrinsic  and  substantial  claims  to  renown,  it  is 
strange  that  he  should  rely  so  much  upon  the  gewgaw  of  a 
spurious  court  for  his  importance,  and  be  in  love  with  the 
raree-show  of  vice-regal  honors.  A  throne  surmounted  with  a 
gorgeous  canopy  of  gold  and  scarlet  was  placed  at  the  extrem- 
ity of  the  room  for  his  reception ;  and  to  this  seat  of  mock 
regality  he  advanced  with  his  vice-queen,  with  a  measured 
and  stately  step.  When  he  had  reached  this  place  of  dignity, 
his  suite  formed  themselves  into  a  hollow  square,  and  excluded 
from  any  too  familiar  approach  the  crowd  of  spectators  that 
thronged  around.  A  sort  of  boundary  was  formed  by  the  lines 
of  aid-de-camps,  train-bearers,  and  pursuivants  of  all  kinds.  I 
presumptuously  advanced  to  the  verge  of  this  sacred  limit, 
when  I  was  checked  by  an  urchin  page  of  about  ten  years  of 
age,  who,  dressed  in  flaming  scarlet,  and  with  his  epaulets 
dropping  in  woven  gold  to  his  heels,  seemed  to  mock  the  con- 
sequence of  his  noble  master,  and  with  an  imperious  squall  he 
enjoined  me  to  keep  back.  I  obeyed  this  Lilliputian  despot, 
and  retired  one  or  two  paces,  but  stood  at  such  a  distance  as 
to  enable  me  to  survey  the  hero  and  heroine  of  the  scene, 

Vol,  1—15 


338  DUBLIN    TABINET   BALL. 

The  Marquis  was  dressed  in  a  rich  uniform,  with  a  profusion 
of  orders.  He  wore  white  pantaloons,  with  short  boots  lined 
with  gold,  and  with  tassels  of  the  same  material.  The  Mar- 
chioness was  dressed  in  white  tabinet,  crossed  with  a  garland 
of  flowers.  She  struck  me  at  once  not  only  as  a  very  fine,  but 
dignified  woman.  Nobody  would  have  suspected  that  she  had 
not  originally  belonged  to  that  proud  aristocracy  to  which  she 
has  been  recently  annexed.  She  has  nothing  of  la  bourgeoise 
parvenue.  I  was  surprised  at  the  gracefulness  with  which  she 
executed  her  first  courtesy,  and  the  ease  with  which,  in  recov- 
ering from  it,  she  brought  herself  back  to  the  altitude  of  state- 
liness  which  I  presume  had  been  prescribed  to  her  for  the 
night.  Her  figure  appeared  to  me  to  be  peculiarly  well  pro- 
portioned. Her  arms  and  shoulders,  though  less  suited  to  Hebe 
than  to  Pomona,  are  finely  moulded ;  and  of  her  waist  I  may 
justly  say  that  it  is  — 

M  Fine  by  degrees,  and  beautifully  less." 

Her  features  approach  to  the  classical  model :  they  have  noth- 
ing of  that  obtuseness  which  in  Ireland  is  frequently  observable 
in  countenances  animated  by  the  vivacity  of  youth,  but  which 
lose  their  charm  when  the  vividness  of  the  eye  becomes  im- 
paired, and  the  bloom  of  the  cheek  has  begun  to  pass  away. 
The  profile  of  Lady  Wellesley  is  at  once  marked  and  delicate. 
Her  complexion  has  not  that  purity  and  milkiness  of  color 
which  belong  to  Irish  beauty,  but  it  is  not,  perhaps,  the  less 
agreeable  from  having  been  touched  by  a  warmer  sun.  Her 
brows  are  softly  and  straightly  pencilled ;  her  cheeks  are  well 
chiselled,  and  an  expression  of  permanent  mildness  sits  upon 
her  lips,  which  I  do  not  regard  as  artificial  and  made  up.  Yet 
I  think  it  too  unvarying  and  fixed.'  Her  smile  is  so  sedate 
and  settled,  that,  although  I  had  several  occasions  to  observe 
her,  her  countenance  seemed  for  hours  not  to  have  undergone 
the  least  change  of  expression.  Some  allowance  ought  to  be 
made  for  this  immovable  serenity,  which  it  may  be  proper 
upon  a  state  occasion  to  assume ;  but  I  am  inclined  to  think 
that  this  monotonous  suavity  is  not  the  mere  smile  of  elaborate 
affability,  but  upon  a  face  less  beautiful  would  amount  \o  an 


VICE-REGAL   PARADE.  339 

eternal  simper.  If  I  were  called  upon  to  point  out,  among  the 
portraitures  of  fictitious  life,  an  illustration  of  the  Marchioness 
of  Wellesley,  I  do  not  think  that  with  reference  to  her  air,  her 
manners,  the  polish  and  urbanity  of  her  address,  and  the  pla- 
cidity of  her  expression,  I  could  select  any  more  appropriate 
than  the  English  heroine  of  Don  Juan — 

"  The  Lady  Adeline  Amundeville." 

The  Marquis  and  the  copartner  of  his  honors,  and  sole  ten 
ant  of  his  heart,  having  made  their  obeisance  to  the  company, 
seated  themselves  upon  the  throne;  and  I  can  not  help  saying 
that,  when  I  saw  them  surrounded  with  all  the  superfluous  cir- 
cumstance of  sovereignty,  and  going  through  the  mock-regal 
farce,  as  if  the  whole  business  were  not  an  idle  and  most  un- 
substantial pageant,  I  felt  pain  at  this  voluntary  exposure  to 
the  ridicule  of  their  political  opponents,  who  seemed  to  gather 
round  for  no  other  purpose  than  to  pay  their  derisive  and  sar- 
donic homage.  Upon  what  pretence  these  airs  of  royalty  were 
assumed  I  could  not  even  guess.  The  gentry  of  Dublin  were 
assembled,  at  the  instance  of  Lady  Wellesley,  to  contribute  to 
the  promotion  of  Irish  manufacture.  This  was  assuredly  no  fit 
occasion  for  the  "  unreal  mockery"  of  evanescent  pomp.  I 
question  whether,  under  such  circumstances,  it  would  be  proper 
in  a  genuine  king  to  indulge  in  regal  parade.  But  it  appears 
to  me  to  be  out  of  all  keeping,  and  to  amount  to  no  venial  sin 
against  good  taste  on  the  part  of  the  mere  shadowy  representa- 
tive of  a  sovereign,  to  invest  himself  in  monarchical  state,  and 
all  "  the  attributes  to  awe  and  majesty." 

The  deportment  of  his  Excellency  tended  to  enhance  the 
burlesque  of  the  whole  business.  He  affected  all  the  noncha- 
lance of  a  person  accustomed  to  royalty.  His  attitude  was  stu- 
diously careless,  while  that  vivid  physiognomy,  of  which,  with 
all  his  practice  in  courts,  he  is  not  the  absolute  master,  betrayed 
his  anxiety  for  the  production  of  effect.  One  of  his  legs  was 
thrown  heedlessly  over  the  other,  to  indicate  that  he  was  per- 
fectly at  his  ease ;  but,  at  the  same  time,  his  piercing  and  sa- 
gacious eye  seemed  to  search  amidst  the  crowd  for  that  rever- 
ence both  to  his  person  and  to  his  office,  to  which  he  surmised 
perhaps,  that  he  possessed  a  somewhat  disputable  claim, 


34:0  DUBLIN   TABINET   BALL. 

I  was  not  a  little  amused  when  his  Excellency's  eyes  encoun- 
tered those  of  that  redoubtable  champion  of  ascendency,  the 
Reverend  Sir  Harcourt  Lees.*  My  English  readers,  who  have 
only  known  Sir  Harcourt  through  the  medium  of  his  loyal 
celebrity,  and  who  have  never  seen  the  prodigy  himself,  may 
be  disposed  to  think  Sir  Harcourt  a  gaunt  and  dreary  man, 
with  a  fanatical  and  desolate  look,  and  with  that  grim  aspect 
of  devotion  which  characterized  the  warlike  propagators  of 
Protestantism  under  the  Cromwellian  standard.  But  nothing 
could  be  more  remote  from  the  plain  realities  of  Sir  Harcourt 
than  this  "  beau-ideal"  of  that  distinguished  personage.  As 
he  was  the  next  person  in  importance  to  Lord  Wellesley  at  the 

*  Sir  Harcourt  Lees,  who  was  born  in  1776,  and  died  in  1846,  was  the  eldest 
son  of  an  Englishman  who  came  to  Ireland  to  officiate  as  private  Secretary  to 
Marquis  Townshend,  when  Viceroy,  and  was  successively  made  Secretary-at- 
War,  and  Secretary  to  the  Irish  Postoffice  —  with  a  patent,  continuing  the  lat- 
ter office  in  his  family.  Under  this  patent,  Edward  S.  Lees,  the  second  son, 
succeeded,  and  held  the  office,  in  Dublin,  for  many  years,  until  he  was  induced  to 
surrender  the  document,  and  was  appointed  to  the  postoffice  in  Edinburgh,  where 
he  died,  after  forty-six  years  public  service.  The  founder  of  the  family,  who 
was  thus  solicitous  to  provide  for  his  offspring,  was  further  honored  with  a  bar- 
onetcy. His  eldest  son,  Harcourt,  succeeded  to  the  title  in  1811,  on  the  death 
of  Sir  John  Lees,  received  valuable  church-preferment,  which,  with  his  patri- 
monial property,  enabled  him  to  live  in  good  style,  at  Black  Rock,  near  Dub- 
lin. One  of  the  mildest  and  most  good-natured  men  in  private,  he  was  bold, 
abusive,  and  truculent  in  public.  He  was  an  Orangeman,  and  violent,  beyond 
all  precedent,  in  his  abuse  of  "  O'Connell,  the  Pope,  and  the  Devil" — for  he 
always  named  the  three  in  one  breath.  He  started  a  weekly  newspaper  called 
"The  Antidote,"  in  which  he  was  wont  to  empty  the  vials  of  his  wrath  upon 
the  Catholics  in  general,  and  Mr.  O'Connell  in  particular.  He  was  accustomed 
to  predict,  once  every  three  months  or  so,  that  there  would  be  a  general  rising 
of  the  disaffected  throughout  Ireland,  and  he  was  perpetually  sending  pe'titions 
to  the  King,  the  Lords,  and  the  Commons,  praying  them  to  "  put  down 
Popery"  and,  above  all,  to  send  O'Connell  to  the  Tower.  When  "  The  Anti- 
dote" went  the  way  of  many  violent  party  journals  —  i  e.  "  to  the  wall," — Sir 
Harcourt  transferred  his  lucubrations  to  "  The  Warder,"  another  weak  and 
weekly  organ  of  the  Orange  faction.  His  handwriting  was  the  most  illegible 
scrawl — just  as  if  an  intoxicated  spider  had  fallen  into  an  inkstand,  and  then 
crawled  and  scrawled  over  a  sheet  of  paper.  It  is  to  Sir  Harcourt's  credit  that 
in  his  charities,  which  were  great,  he  made  no  distinction  on  account  of  reli- 
gion ;  to  want  was  sufficient  claim  on  the  benevolence  of  this  most  eccentric 
man.  He  was  much  liked  by  the  Catholics  whom  he  employed,  and  was  on 
terms  almost  friendly  with  O'Connell,  against  whom  he  was  always  writing. — M 


SIR   HARCOURT   LEES.  341 

Tabinet  Ball,  it  may  not  be  inapposite  to  say  a  word  or  two 
about  him. 

For  many  years  he  was  unknown  to  the  public,  and  among 
his  own  immediate  friends  was  regarded  as  a  harmless  and 
somewhat  simple  man,  who  could  discuss  a  bottle  of  claret 
much  better  than  a  homily,  a  daring  fox-hunter,  and  a  good- 
humored  divine,  who  would  have  passed  without  any  sort  of 
note,  but  for  certain  flashes  of  singularity  which  occasionally 
broke  out,  and  exhibited  points  of  character  at  variance  with 
his  general  habits.  What  was  the  astonishment  of  all  Dublin, 
when  it  was  announced  that  this  plain  and  unobtrusive  lover 
of  the  field  was  the  author  of  a  pamphlet  filled  with  the  most 
virulent  and  acrimonious  matter  against  the  religion  of  the 
country,  and  which  almost  amounted  to  a  call  on  the  Protest- 
ant population  to  rise  up  in  arms  and  extirpate  Popery  from 
the  land  !  The  incongruous  images,  the  grotesque  associations, 
and  the  mixture  of  drollery  and  absurdity,  indicated  some  dis- 
temper in  the  writer's  mind  ;  but  the  political  passions  which 
raged  at  the  time  prevented  the  Protestants  from  perceiving 
the  symptoms  of  delirium  in  what  they  took  for  inspiration. 

Sir  Harcourt  became  a  public  man.  I  had  never  seen  him 
before  the  publication  of  his  book,  and  was  a  good  deal  sur- 
prised to  find  that  all  this  uproar  had  been  produced  by  a  little 
lumpish  man,  who  rather  looked  like  a  superannuated  jockey 
than  a  divine,  with  an  equestrian  slouch  in  his  walk,  and  the 
manger  in  his  face,  and  with  a  mouth  the  graceful  configuration 
of  which  appeared  to  have  been  formed  by  the  humming  of 
that  stable-melody  with  which  the  application  of  the  curry- 
comb is  generally  accompanied.* 

*  Sir  Harcourt  Lees  dressed  very  much  unlike  a  clergyman  —  or  even  a  gen- 
tleman. A  rusty  and  broad-brimmed  hat  covered  his  head.  He  shaved  some- 
times, and  the  unfrequency  did  not  improve  his  face.  Round  his  neck  was 
twisted  a  sort  of  rope  of  cambric,  which  probably  had  been  white.  On  his  back 
was  a  shabby  black  coat,  much  too  large  for  him,  which  appeared  guiltless,  since 
it  was  built,  of  ttie  slightest  coquetry  with  a  clothes-brush.  The  rest  of  his  body 
was  contained  within  a  capacious  pair  of  drab  inexpressibles,  his  legs  weie  en« 
cased  in  riding-boots  wi  'h  light  brown  tops,  and  his  hands  were  never  *  pent 
up"  on  any  occasion,  in  >he  "  Utica"  of  a  pair  of  gloves.  He  always  carried  a 
huge  horsewhip,  and,  whether  he  walked  or  rode,  perpetually  whistled  "The 
Fox-hunter's  Jig." — M. 


S42  Dublin  tabtnist  ball. 

After  looking  at  this  singular  figure  which  the  tutelary  ge- 
nius of  the  Church  had  chosen  for  its  residence,  I  gave  up  all 
my  belief  in  physiognomy,  and  renounced  Lavater  for  ever. 
I  have  since  heard  that  the  doctrines  of  Gall  are  by  no  means 
so  much  contradicted  by  the  head  of  this  celebrated  person  as 
the  theory  of  the  Swiss  philosopher  is  refuted  by  his  face  ;  and 
that  divers  protuberances  are  observable  upon  Sir  Harcourt's 
pericranium,  in  which  vanity,  ferocity,  and  ambition,  together 
with  certain  other  of  the  polemical  faculties,  may  be  easily 
discerned.  It  is  even  whispered  that  a  disciple  of  Gall,  who 
recently  came  over  from  Edinburgh,  discovered  some  bumps 
upon  the  head  of  Doctor  Magee,  between  which  and  the  skull 
of  Sir  Harcourt  there  Avas  a  remarkable  affinity.  In  the  for- 
mer there  was  a  much  larger  quantity  of  brain,  but  the  theo- 
logical passions  of  Sir  Harcourt  are  not  less  prominently  pro- 
nounced. It  has  been  added,  but  I  can  not  take  upon  myself 
to  say  with  what  truth,  that  a  curious  speculator  in  that  fantas- 
tic science  has  caused  the  skull  of  the  last  Sir  Thomas  Osborne 
to  be  dug  up,  and  that  the  resemblance  between  Sir  Harcourt 
and  that  eminent  author  is  truly  surprising. 

But  I  feel  that  I  am  digressing.  Enough  to  say  that  Sir 
Harcourt's  success  in  his  first  essay  against  Popery  led  to  other 
achievements  in  controversy,  and  that  he  was  at  length  recog- 
nised beyond  all  dispute  as  the  most  appropriate  champion  of 
the  Irish  Church.  His  whole  character  may  be  summed  up  in 
a  single  sentence  of  Swift :  "  He  hath  been  poring  so  long  upon 
Fox's  '  Book  of  Martyrs,'  that  he  imagines  himself  living  in  the 
reign  of  Queen  Mary,  and  is  resolved  to  set  up  as  a  knight- 
errant  against  Popery." 

The  meeting  between  the  Marquis  Wellesley  and  this  cele- 
brated person  at  the  Tabinet  Ball  excited  all  my  attention.  I 
did  not  perceive  the  latter,  until  a  certain  expression  of  defi- 
ance, which  suddenly  came  into  the  Marquis's  face,  directed 
my  notice  to  the  quarter  toward  which  he  was  looking,  when  I 
beheld,  exactly  opposite  his  Excellency,  the  chief  though  not 
very  majestic  pillar  of  the  Establishment.  The  worthy  Baro- 
net had  thrown  an  expression  of  derision  into  his  countenance, 
and  did  not  look  very  unlike  a  picture  of  Momus  upon  Mr.  Lis- 


THE    HEIR    OF   THE    GERALDINES. 


m 


ton's  snuff-box.*  The  Marquis  might  readily  have  conjectured 
that  he  was  laughing  at  him,  and  that  the  recollection  of  his 
Excellency's  exploits  was  not  a  little  amusing.  Seated  upon 
the  throne,  with  his  clinched  hand  resting  upon  his  thigh,  and 
his  marked  and  diplomatic  visage  protruded  in  all  the  intensity 
of  expression  for  which  it  is  remarkable,  the  most  noble  and 
puissant  Marquis  shot  his  fine  and  indignant  eyes  into  the  soul 
of  his  antagonist;  while  Sir  Harcourt,  with  a  half-waggish  and 
half-malevolent  aspect,  blending  the  grin  of  an  ostler  with  the 
acrimony  of  a  divine,  encountered  the  lofty  look  of  the  chief 
governor  of  Ireland  with  a  jocular  disdain,  and  gave  him  to 
understand  that  a  man  of  his  theological  mettle  was  not  to  be 
subjugated  by  a  frown.  This  physiognomical  encounter  lasted 
for  a  few  minutes  ;  and  but  that  Master  Ellis,  touching  Sir  Har- 
court upon  the  shoulder,  relieved  the  Marquis  from  his  glance, 
the  result  would  in  all  probability  have  been,  that,  indignant 
at  the  spirit  of  mockery  that  pervaded  the  features  of  the  Bar- 
onet, his  Excellency  would  have  yielded  to  his  emotions,  and, 
starting  up  in  a  paroxysm  of  imaginary  royalty,  have  exclaimed, 
"Ay,  every  inch  a  king!" 

The  next  person  in  importance  to  Sir  Harcourt  was  his  Grace 
the  Duke  of  Leinster.f     With  the  highest  rank,  and  a  magnifi- 

*  John  Liston,  the  hest  low  comedian  of  his  time,  possessed  much  natural 
humor,  naturally  illustrated  by  peculiar  features  which,  whether  in  repose 
or  action,  were  remarkably  mirth-exciting.  The  moment  an  audience  saw  his 
face,  they  felt  compelled  to  laugh.  He  had  the  merit,  rare  in  actors,  of  not 
playing  to  his  audience  :  what  he  said  and  did  was  apparently  irrespective  of 
any  spectators.  He  was  of  a  very  melancholy  temperament,  though  he  caused 
wit  and  mirth  in  others.  He  realized  a  large  fortune,  at  the  London  theatres. 
In  1831  te  had  one  hundred  pounds  sterling  a  week  from  Madame  Vestris, 
at  the  Olympic  (a  small  theatre,  in  an  inconvenient  by-street),  and  remained 
on  this  engagement  for  the  last  six  years  of  his  professional  life.  Ten  years 
elapsed  between  his  retirement  and  his  death,  which  took  place  in  1846,  in  his 
sixty-ninth  yeai\ — M. 

t  The  Duke  of  Leinster — "Ireland's  only  Duke"  and  premier  Marquis,  is 
head  of  the  noble  house  of  Fitzgerald,  the  founder  of  which  came  to  England 
with  William  the  Conqueror,  in  1066.  Maurice  Fitzgerald,  who  accompanied 
Henry  II.,  in  1172,  and  assisted  in  the  subjugation  of  Ireland  was  rewarded 
with  a  large  grant  of  land  in  Leinster,  and  was  appointed  one  of  the  Governors 
of  the  conquered  country.  His  son  Gerald,  was  created  Lord  of  Offaley,  in  1216, 
which  title  continues,    held  "by  tenure"  —  which  marks    its  antiquity.      The 


£44  DUBtlK   TABIHET   BAIL. 

cent  estate,  and  with  a  name  to  which  so  many  national  recol 
lections  are  painfully  but  endearingly  allied,  it  must  be  con 
fessed  that  the  first  peer  in  Ireland,  notwithstanding  so  many 
claims  upon  the  public  respect,  is  less  sensibly  felt,  and  pro- 
duces an  impression  less  distinct  and  palpable,  than  the  re- 
nowned champion  of  the  Church.  The  one  is  at  the  head  of 
the  nobles  and  the  other  of  the  Protestants  of  Ireland ;  and 
however  insane  the  alacrity  of  Sir  Harcourt  may  appear,  there 
is  something  in  enthusiasm,  be  it  genuine  or  affected,  which  is 
preferable  to  the  inactive  honesty  and  the  inoperative  integrity 
of  the  Duke.  The  latter  is  descended  from  the  first  Norman  set- 
tlers in  Ireland.  The  Fitzgeralds  gradually  became  attached 
to  the  country,  and  were  designated  as  the  ultra-Irish,  from  the 
barbarous  nationality,  of  which,  in  the  course  of  that  series  of 
rebellions  dignified  by  the  name  of  Irish  history,  they  gave 
repeated  proof.  They  were  of  that  class  of  insurgents  who 
earned  the  ignominious  appellation  of  "Hibernis  ipsis  Hibernio- 
resT  I  recollect  to  have  seen  their  pedigree  upon  a  piece  of  mould- 
ering parchment,  which  was  produced  at  a  trial  in  Waterford, 
connected  with  the  royalties  of  Dromona,  and  had  been  brought 
by  a  messenger  from  the  Tower  in  London.  It  was  a  very 
remarkable  document.  The  words  "  attainted"  or  "  beheaded" 
were  annexed  to  the  names  of  more  than  half  the  members  of 
this  illustrious  house. 

The  love  of  Ireland  appears  to  have  been  a  family  disease, 

representative  of  this  house  was  created  Earl  of  Kildare,  in  131G,  and  the  hol- 
der of  this  Earldom  was  made  Viscount  Leinster,  in  the  English  peerage,  in 
1745-'6.  The  Irish  Marquisate  of  Kildare  was  conferred,  in  1761,  and  the 
Dukedom  in  1766.  The  present  Duke  of  Leinster,  who  lives  mostly  in  England, 
has  always  professed  Whig  principles,  which  are  usually  anti-Irish.  Bom  in 
1791,  the  Duke  was  only  in  his  seventh  year,  when  his  gallant  and  unfortunate 
■mcle,  Lord  Edward  Fitzgerald,  perished,  in  1798.  So  much  undistinguished 
has  the  Duke's  life  been  (the  Irish  significantly  call  him  "a  chip  in  porridge") 
that  the  only  noticeable  thing  connected  with  him,  recorded  on  the  tablets  of 
my  memory,  is  the  anecdote  of  his  visiting  Beau  Brummell,  at  his  retreat  in 
Caen.  The  Duke,  who  was  fresh  from  Paris,  where  he  had  availed  himself  of 
the  adorning  aid  of  a  French  tailor,  asked  the  Beau  what  he  thought  of  his 
coat?  Brummell,  taking  hold  of  the  collar  of  it  delicately,  between  his  finger 
and  thumb,  smiled  contemptuously  and  drawled  out,  "  My  dear  fellow,  do  you 
call  this  thing — a  coat?" — M, 


Lord  edwakd  fitzgerald.  M5 

and  to  have  descended  to  the  unfortunate  Lord  Edward  as  a 
malady  of  the  heart,  although  the  sanguinary  record  of  the 
virtues  of  his  house  did  not  include  his  name ;  but  it  was 
impossible  to  look  upon  that  memorial  of  the  scaffold,  without 
recalling  the  memory  of  the  celebrated  person  whose  failure 
constituted  so  large  a  portion  of  his  crime  *  It  may  be  readily 
imagined,  that  when  the  Duke  of  Leinster  returned  to  Ireland 
after  having  attained  his  full  age,  in  order  to  take  possession 

*  Lord  Edward  Fitzgerald,  whose  tragic  fate  has  excited  much  sympathy, 
was  only  thirty-five  years  old,  in  1798,  when  the  Irish  insurrection  broke  out. 
He  served  in  America  as  aide-de-camp  to  Lord  Rawdon,  and  on  his  return 
home,  in  1783,  obtained  a  seat  in  the  Irish  House  of  Commons,  which  he  did 
not  long  retain,  finding  legislation  insipid.  He  returned  to  America,  where 
he  imbibed  republican  principles.  William  Cobbett,  who  was  Serjeant-Majorin 
his  regiment,  was  discharged  through  his  influence,  and  described  him  as  "  a 
most  humane  and  excellent  man,  and  the  only  real  honest  officer  he  ever  knew 
in  the  army."  On  Lord  Edward's  return,  in  1790,  he  re-entered  Parliament :  vis- 
ited Paris,  during  the  Revolution,  got  acquainted  with  Paine;  desired  his 
mother  to  address  him  as  "  Le  Citoyen  Edward  Fitzgerald,"  assisted  at  a  pub- 
lic dinner  in  celebration  of  the  successes  of  the  French  armies ;  publicly  re- 
nounced his  title ;  declared  himself  a  republican ;  and,  in  consequence,  was 
dismissed  the  British  army.  He  married  Pamela,  supposed  to  be  Madame  de 
Genlis'  daughter  by  the  Duke  of  Orleans  (Egalite)  ;  returned  to  Dublin  ;  became 
one  of  the  United  Irishmen,  joined  an  armed  association  against  which  the 
Viceroy  issued  a  proclamation ;  made  a  Parliamentary  attack  on  the  Viceroy 
and  the  majority  of  the  House  of  Commons,  as  being  "  the  worst  subjects  the 
King  had ;"  —  apologized  by  saying,  "  I  am  sony  for  it;"  went  to  Paris,  to  en- 
gage the  Directory  to  aid  the  contemplated  revolt  against  British  authority ; 
was  suspected  by  the  Government,  who  issued  a  warrant  for  his  apprehension, 
but  gave  him  several  opportunities  of  escape,  which  he  declined,  saying  he  was 
too  much  involved  with  others  to  obtain  safety  without  dishonor;  had  a  thou- 
sand pounds  offered  for  his  apprehension ;  was  discovered  in  a  place  of  con- 
cealment; killed  one  of  his  pursuers  with  a  dagger;  was  himself  wounded  and 
overpowered  ;  and  died  soon  after,  in  June,  1798.  He  was  attainted,  as  a  traitor, 
by  the  Crown,  and  one  of  Curran's  best  speeches  was  against  the  injustice  of 
their  assuming  the  guilt  of  a  man  neither  tried  nor  convicted,  and  of  debarring 
his  children  from  their  birth-right.  The  attainder  was  removed  by  George  IV., 
which  elicited  a  sonnet  of  thanks  from  Lord  Byron.  The  widow  of  Lord  Ed- 
ward went  to  reside  at  Hamburgh,  but  married  again  within  two  years.  There 
appears  to  have  been  only  one  opinion,  and  that  most  favorable,  of  the  frank 
nature,  the  chivalrous  bearing,  the  active  benevolence,  the  high  honor,  the  gal- 
lant courage,  and  the  unselfish  patriotism  of  Lord  Edward  He  was  uncle  to 
the  present  Duke  of  Leinster. —  JVI. 

Lit* 


346  iynfeLTtf  tabinet  ball. 

of  his  estates,  he  was  an  object  of  great  national  interest. 
The  associations  connected  with  his  name  had  already  secured 
him  the  partialities  of  the  country.  His  frank  and  open  air, 
the  unaffected  urbanity  of  his  manners,  the  kindness  and  cor- 
diality which  distinguished  his  address,  and  an  expression  of 
dignified  good  nature  in  his  physiognomy,  brought  back  the 
recollection  of  Lord  Edward,  and  gave  to  his  young  kinsman 
a  share  in  the  affectionate  respect  with  which  the  guilty  patri- 
otism of  that  chivalrous  nobleman  is  regarded  in  Ireland. 
Few  were  sufficiently  rash  to  desire  that  the  Duke  of  Leinster 
should  engage  in  an  enterprise  so  little  likely  to  be  successful, 
as  that  which  cost  Lord  Edward  his  life.  Almost  all  men  had 
become  sensible  of  the  hopelessness  of  such  an  undertaking : 
but  it  was  expected  that,  while  the  chief  of  the  house  of 
Fitzgerald  would  abstain  from  any  criminally  adventurous 
speculation,  he  would,  notwithstanding,  place  himself  at  the 
head  of  the  popular  party ;  that  he  would  rally  round  him 
the  friends  of  the  country ;  that  he  would  extend  to  good 
principles  the  authority  of  his  rank,  and  rescue  the  spirit  of 
Irish  whiggism  from  the  scoff  with  which  it  had  been  the 
fashion  in  the  higher  circles  to  deride  it. 

A  scope  of  political  usefulness  was  unquestionably  given  to 
the  Duke.  It  would  have  been  easy  for  him  to  raise  up  a 
legitimate  and  salutary  opposition  to  the  abuses  of  the  local 
government,  which  were  at  that  time  excessive,  and  to  have 
awed  the  viceregal  despotism  of  the  Duke  of  Richmond  into 
moderation.  There  was  enough  ,of  public  virtue  left  among 
the  aristocracy,  to  turn  it  to  good  practical  account,  if  there 
had  been  any  man  capable  of  giving  it  a  direction  ;  and  of  all 
others,  the  young  Duke  of  Leinster,  from  his  paramount  rank 
and  hereditary  station,  seemed  to  be  calculated  to  take  the 
honorable  lead.  What  might  not  a  Duke  of  Leinster,  with 
even  ordinary  abilities,  and  with  an  active,  steadfast,  and 
energetic  mind,  accomplish  in  this  country  ?  He  might  place 
himself  at  once  in  the  front  of  a  vast  and  ardent  population, 
and  become  not  only  the  protector  of  the  Catholics,  but  the 
director  of  the  whole  body  of  liberal  Protestants  in  Ireland. 
The  distinctions  of  sect  would,  under  his  influence,  be  merged 


*iiE   DUKE    OF   LETNSTER.  34? 

in  the  community  of  country,  and  all  religious  animosities  give 
way  to  a  comprehensive  and  philosophical  sentiment  of  nation- 
ality. He  would  be  the  point  of  contact,  at  Avhich  the  con- 
tending factions  might  meet  an cT* cohere  together.  His  rank 
and  property  would  attract  the  men  who  profess  illiberal 
opinions  as  much  out  of  fashion  as  out  of  prejudice  ;  while  the 
democratic  parts  would  find  in  his  name  and  blood  a  sufficient 
guaranty  for  his  fidelity  to  Ireland.  Having  been  once  asso- 
ciated in  a  stricter  intimacy,  it  is  likely  that  the  enthusiasts  on 
both  sides  would  lay  down  a  large  portion  of  their  antipathies, 
and  acquire  a  feeling  of  forbearance  toward  each  other.  Par- 
tisanship would  in  a  little  time  subside,  and  Catholics  and 
Orangemen  would  enter  into  a  pacific  confederacy  for  the 
public  good. 

Such  a  junction,  formed  under  the  auspices  of  a  Duke  of 
Leinster,  would  secure  to  him  the  respect  of  a  wise,  and  the 
fears  of  a  corrupt  administration.  His  opinions  among  the 
hereditary  counsellors  of  the  crown  would  carry  a  paramount 
authority.  His  voice  in  the  senate  would  be  that  of  seven  mil- 
lions of  his  fellow-countrymen  ;  Ireland  would  speak  through 
him.  The  consciousness  of  the  minister  that,  in  times  of 
difficulty  and  of  danger,  the  Irish  people  could  readily  find  a 
man  who  would  insist  upon  justice  —  who,  sustained  by  a 
united  population,  could  insure  whatever  he  required  —  would 
instruct  the  most  arbitrary  statesman  in  the  anticipating  wis- 
dom of  concession.  It  is  difficult  to  conceive  a  more  lofty  or  a 
more  useful  part,  than  that  which  it  would  be  easy  for  a  Duke 
of  Leinster  to  perform  ;  and  the  facility  with  which  this  ideal 
picture  would  be  realized,  induces  the  more  regret  that  a  per- 
son surrounded  with  such  numerous  opportunities  of  doing 
good  should  have  omitted  the  splendid  occasions  thrown  by 
birth  and  fortune  in  his  way.  He  has  voluntarily  consigned 
himself  to  oblivion. 

It  required,  indeed,  that  he  should  make  a.  sort  of  effort  to 
be  forgotten.  He  has  at  last  succeeded  in  sinking  out  of  the 
recollection  of  the  public.  He  has,  if  I  may  so  say,  dived  into 
Lethe,  from  which  he  hardly  ever  lifts  his  head.  The  first 
injudicious  step  which  he  adopted  was  the  sale  of  his  magnifi 


S48  DTJBLltT   TABINET  BALL. 

cent  mansion  in  Merrion  Square.  It  surpasses  any  private 
residence  in  London,  and  rather  resembles  the  palace  of  a 
Venetian  senator  than  the  house  of  a  British  subject.  That 
vast  structure,  upon  which  enormous  sums  had  been  expended 
by  his  father,  was  a  perpetual  intimation  of  the  importance  of 
the  Duke,  as  long  as  it  was  called  Leinster  House ;  but  after 
he  had  sold  it  to  the  Dublin  Society,  and  its  original  designa- 
tion was  laid  aside,  a  memorial  of  the  family  was  wanting, 
which  the  Duke's  political  conduct  was  not  calculated  to  sup- 
ply. He  was  not  contented  with  this  disposal  of  his  family 
mansion,  but  took  a  small  house  in  Dominick  street,  which  he 
dignified  with  the  appellatio7i  of  the  Duke  of  Leinster's  Office. 
Many  ascribed  the  sale  of  his  palace  (for  such  it  might  be 
called)  to  a  penurious  tendency ;  but,  although  the  Duke  is  a 
prudent  man,  he  is  not,  I  believe,  addicted  to  that  most  ignoble 
of  all  vices,  and  avarice  forms  no  part  of  his  character.  The 
truth  is,  that  the  Duke  of  Leinster  is  wholly  insensible  to 
fame ;  and  such  is  his  aversion  to  publicity,  that  I  could  never 
bring  myself  to  give  any  credit  to  the  statement  in  Harriet 
Wilson's  Memoirs,  that  his  Grace  was  in  the  habit  of  standing 
behind  her  carriage.*  He  has  such  a  horror  of  the  general 
eye,  that  I  hold  it  to  be  impossible  that  he  could  ever  have 
achieved  a  piece  of  such  open  and  undisguised  gallantry  as 
the  modern  Aspasia  has  been  pleased  to  ascribe  to  him. 

After  having  sold  his  house,  the  Duke  retired  to  the  woods 
and  solitudes  of  Carton.t     There  he  buried  himself  from  the 

*  "  The  Memoirs  of  Harriet  Wilson,"  which  were  published  about  1824. 
professed  to  be  written  by  a  noted  London  courtesan,  one  of  whose  sisters  had 
married  Lord  Berwick,  a  wealthy  peer  in  Shropshire.  This  book,  which  was 
written  on  "  black-mail"  principle,  was  crowded  with  details  of  Miss  Wilson's 
amours,  and  brought  in  the  names  of  most  of  her  very  extensive  acquaintance 
with  the  fashionable  and  aristocratical  men  of  her  time.  She  made  a  consid- 
erable aum  by  the  sale  of  the  work,  and  yet  more  by  what  she  received  for  the 
suppression  of  scandals,  whether  true  or  false.  With  this  money,  Harriet 
Wilson  retired  to  Paris,  where  a  French  Colonel  married  her.  Twenty  years 
aftei,  she  returned  to  England,  affected  to  have  become  an  imminent  Christian, 
and  died  in  1846.  — M. 

t  Carton,  in  the  County  of  Kildare,  is  the  family  mansion  and  estate  of  the 
Duke  of  Leinster.  It  was  purchased,  in  January,  1738-'9,  by  Robert,  nine 
teenth  Earl  of  Kildare,  from  Thomas  Ingoldsby,  in  Buckinghamshire,  Eng- 
land.—  M. 


A   NOBLE   WOODMAN.  34:9 

inspection,  and  gradually  dropped  out  of  the  notice,  of  the 
country.  Having  a  turn  for  mechanics,  he  provided  himself 
with  a  large  assortment  of  carpenters'  tools,  and  beguiled  the 
tedium  of  existence  with  occupations  by  which  his  arms  were 
put  into  requisition.  There  is  not  a  better  sawyer  in  the 
county  of  Kildare.  As  you  wander  through  the  forests  on  his 
demesne,  you  occasionally  meet  a  vigorous  young  woodman, 
with  his  shirt  tucked  up  to  his  shoulders,  while  he  lays  the  axe 
to  the  trunk  of  some  lofty  tree  that  totters  beneath  his  stroke. 
On  approaching,  you  perceive  a  handsome  face,  flushed  with 
exercise  and  health,  and  covered  with  perspiration.  Should 
you  enter  into  conversation  with  him,  he  will  throw  off  a  few 
jovial  words  between  every  descent  of  the  axe ;  and,  if  he 
should  pause  in  his  task  for  breath,  will  hail  you  in  the  tone 
of  good-humored  fellowship.  He  sets  to  his  work  again ; 
while  you  pursue  your  path  through  the  woodlands,  and  hear 
from  the  ranger  of  the  forest  that  you  have  just  seen  no  less 
a  person  than  his  Grace  himself. 

In  the  midst  of  these  innocent  employments,  the  Duke  of 
Leinster  passes  away  a  life  which  ought  to  be  devoted  to 
higher  purposes.  It  is  with  the  utmost  difficulty  that  he  is 
occasionally  dragged  out  of  his  retreat,  and  consents,  some 
once  a-year,  to  fill  the  chair  at  a  public  meeting.  But  he 
takes  no  part  in  the  deliberations  or  the  measures  of  popular 
assemblies,  for  which  he  entertains  an  unaffected  distaste,  and 
hurries  back  to  his  domestic  occupations  again.  The  result 
has  been,  that  he  not  only  holds  no  place  in  the  public  estima- 
tion beyond  that  which  his  private  virtues  confer  upon  him, 
but  he  is  without  any  influence  at  the  Castle.  Shortly  after 
Lord  Wellesley  came  to  Ireland,  the  Duke  called  to  pay  his 
respects  to  his  Excellency,  who  sent  him  an  intimation  that  he 
was  at  the  moment  too  busily  engaged  to  see  him,  but  that,  in 
case  he  called  again,  he  should  be  happy  to  receive  his  Grace. 

At  the  Tabinet  Ball  (from  which  I  have  made  a  wide 
digression,  into  somewhat  too  serious,  if  not  extraneous  mat- 
ter), it  was  easy  to  observe  that  the  Duke  of  Leinster,  sur- 
rounded as  he  was  by  all  the  provincial  rank  and  wealth  of 
publin?  was  not  an  object  of  much  public  concern.     As  }}Q 


o50  DUBLIN    TABINET   BALL. 

mingled  among  the  various  circles  in  the  saloon,  some  person, 
who  chanced  to  know  him,  just  mentioned,  "There  is  the  Duke 
of  Leinster;"  while  his  Grace,  neither  attracting  nor  caring 
for  any  further  notice,  passed  on  without  heed  to  some  other 
part  of  the  room.  How  different  an  impression  would  he  have 
produced,  had  he  taken  the  more  active  and  intrepid  part, 
to  which  his  fortunes  appeared  to  invite  him !  The  mock 
regality  of  a  lord-lieutenant  would  fade  at  once  before  him. 
The  representative  of  a  nation  would  stand  superior  to  the 
delegate  of  the  king.  But,  in  drawing  this  contrast,  it  would 
be  an  injustice  not  to  add,  that,  after  all,  the  Duke  of  Leinster 
has  a  right  to  make  a  selection  of  happiness  for  himself.  He 
has  no  ambition.  Nature  has  not  mixed  that  mounting  quality 
in  his  blood  which  teaches  men  to  aspire  to  greatness,  and 
makes  them  impatient  of  subordination.  If  he  is  deficient  in 
energy,  and  is  without  the  temperament  necessary  for  high 
enterprise,  he  is  adorned  by  many  gentle  and  perhaps  redeem- 
ing virtues.  His  life  is  blameless  in  every  domestic  relation ; 
and  if  he  is  not  admired,  he  is  prized,  at  least  by  all  those 
who  are  acquainted  with  him.  He  looks,  and  I  am  convinced 
he  is,  an  exceedingly  happy  man ;  and  has  at  all  events  one 
of  the  chief  means  of  felicity,  in  the  amiable  and  accomplished 
woman  to  whom  he  is  united. 

The  Duchess  of  Leinster  accompanied  her  husband  to  the 
Tabinet  Ball.  This  excellent  lady  is  one  of  the  daughters  of 
Lord  Harrington.*  She  has  been  some  years  married  to  the 
Duke,  and  has  the  reputation  of  being  a  most  affectionate 
mother  and  wife.  Although  an  Englishwoman,  she  prefers 
Ireland  to  her  own  country,  and  has  never  seduced  her  hus- 
band into  absenteeism.     Lady  Morgan  should  make  a  heroine 


*  The  Duchess  of  Leinster,  was  aunt  of  the  4th  Earl  of  Harrington,  farmer!* 
known  in  fashionable  life  as  Lord  Petersham,  who  married  Maria  Foote,  the 
lovely  actress,  in  1831,  and  died  in  1851.  His  brother,  known  as  Colonel  Lei- 
cester Stanhope,  Byron's  intimate  and  companion  in  Greece  is  the  present  Ear) 
and  married  the  beautiful  Miss  Green,  niece  to  Mr.  Hall,  now  Chief  Police 
magistrate,  at  Bow  street,  London.  This  lady,  some  twenty  years  ago,  when 
in  the  bloom  of  youth,  was  considered  one  of  the  most  beautiful  women  \n  tbo 
fashionable  wo-ld  of  London  — M» 


THE   DUCHESS    OF   LEINSTER.  351 

of  her.*  Few  persons  are  more  esteemed  and  loved  than  she 
is.  There  is  a  charm  in  her  kind  and  good-hearted  manners, 
which  engages  the  partiality  of  those  about  her,  and  converts 
that  respect  which  is  due  to  her  station  into  regard.  I  have 
never  seen  any  lady  of  her  distinction  in  society  so  wholly 
free  from  assumption.  There  is  the  enchantment  of  sincerity 
in  her  sweet  demeanor,  which,  in  the  manners  of  the  great,  is 
above  every  other  charm.  She  is  not  beautiful ;  but  there  is 
about  her  — 

"  Something  than  beauty  clearer, 

That  for  a  face  not  beautiful  does  more 
Than  beauty  for  the  fairest  face  can  do." 

A  look  of  benignity,  united  with  a  pleasant  and  vivacious 
smile,  makes  you  forget  a  certain  want  of  regularity  in  her 
features.  I  do  not  quite  like  her  deportment  and  gait.  There 
seems  to  be  a  weakness  in  her  limbs,  which  prevents  a  steadi- 
ness and  measure  of  movement,  necessary  for  a  perfect  grace- 
fulness of  head.  But  it  is  only  after  a  minute  observation, 
made  in  the  spirit  which  is  "nothing  if  not  critical,"  that  any 
such  imperfections  are  discerned,  and  they  are  speedily  forgot- 
ten in  the  feeling  of  kindness  which  her  noble  gentleness  can 
not  fail  to  produce. 

It  was  amusing  to  observe  the  contrast  between  the  unosten- 
tatious affability  of  her  Grace,  and  the  factitious  loftiness  of 
the  other  titled  patronesses  of  the  ball.  Lady  Wellesley  had 
nominated  a  certain  number  of  vice-presidents  of  the  dance, 
who  were  directed  tc  appear  with  a  head-dress  of  ostrich- 
feathers,  by  way  of  distinguishing  them  from  the  ladies  to 
whom  that  high  function  had-not  been  confided.  Accordingly, 
about  a  dozen  heads,  stuck  with  a  profusion  of  waving  plu- 
mage, lifting  their  nodding  honors  above  the  crowd.     These 

*  Lady  Morgan,  whose  maiden  name  was  Sydney  Owenson,  was  daughter 
of  an  actor,  who  anglicized  his  patronimic  Mac-Owen,  and  was  a  good  ner- 
former  of  Irish  characters.  Her  novel,  "  The  Wild  Irish  Girl,"  brought  her 
into  notice,  and  her  works,  principally  travels  and  fiction,  have  obtained  het 
much  reputation.  She  wrote  the  well-known  song  of  "  Kate  Kearney."  She 
married  Sir  Charles  Morgan,  a  medical  man  in  Dublin.  The  British  Govern- 
ment has  given  her  a  pension  of  thre'e  hundred  pounds  sterling  a  year.  She 
i]  'cs  ,'n  London,  but  her  failing  sight  and  the  weight  of  nearly  eighty  yea/Sj 
l)V'c  co.  milled  her  to  relinquish  her  literary  pursuits. —  M, 


352  DUBLIN   TABINET  BALL. 

reminded  me  of  the  Mexican  princesses  in  prints  of  Monte- 
zuma's court,  which  I  have  seen  in  the  History  of  New  Spain. 
The  absence  of  any  superfluity  of  attire  did  not  make  the 
resemblance  less  striking.  It  was  pleasant  to  observe  the 
authoritative  simper  with  which  they  discharged  their  high- 
plumed  office,  and  intimated  the  important  part  which  they 
were  appointed  to  play  in  this  fantastic  scene.  Upon  the  vul- 
gar in  the  crowd,  such  as  the  wives  of  rich  burghers,  of  opulent 
attorneys,  and  of  stuff-gown  lawyers,  they  looked  with  ineffable 
disdain  ;  and  even  to  the  fat  consorts  of  the  aldermen,  they 
scarcely  extended  a  smile  of  supercilious  recognition. 

Busily  engaged  among  the  latter,  I  observed  Mr.  Henry 
Grattan,  who  was  then  a  candidate,  and  is  now  a  representa- 
tive of  the  city  of  Dublin.  This  gentleman  was  not  a  little 
strenuous  at  the  Tabinet  Ball,  in  his  attentions  to  the  ladies, 
both  young  and  elderly,  of  the  Corporation.  He  had,  upon  a 
former  occasion,  been  defeated  by  Master  Ellis,  through  the 
influence  of  the  civic  authorities,  and  was  determined  to  con- 
ciliate the  leading  members  of  the  powerful  body  by  which  he 
had  been  successfully  opposed.  He  is  a  singular  example  of 
perseverance,  and,  I  rejoice  to  add,  of  success,  in  the  steadfast 
pursuit  of  an  honorable  object.  His  name,  the  veneration  in 
which  his  father's  memory  is  so  justly  held  by  every  true  lover 
of  his  country,  and  the  earnest  which  he  has  himself  already 
given  of  eminent  abilities  and  of  public  virtue,  gather  much  of 
the  popular  solicitude  about  him,  and  render  his  career  in  par- 
liament a  matter  of  interesting  speculation.  Some  mention  of 
this  young  senator,  whose  foot  is  yet  upon  the  threshold  of  the 
House,  may  not  be  inappropriate.  "  How  widely,"  the  reader 
may  say,  "  do  you  deviate  from  the  Tabinet  Ball !"  Be  it  so. 
I  set  down  my  thoughts  as  they  flow  carelessly  from  my  pen. 

A  word  or  two,  then,  of  Mr.  Henry  Grattan  *     He  is  the 

*  Mi'.  Henry  Grattan  continued  to  sit  in  Parliament  for  a  long-  series  of  years 
and  was  uniformly  constant  in  his  attendance,  and  liberal  in  his  principles.. 
He  usually  voted  with  O'Connell.  He  is  not  a  member  of  the  present  Parlia- 
ment. Although  pains-taking  and  industi'ious,  as  a  business-man,  his  public 
course  has  not  been  very  distinguished.  He  has  published  a  very  reliable  and 
interesting  work, — his  father's  "Life  and  Times,"  which  is  indispensable  t- 
t|)e  student  of  Irish  history. —  M. 


THE  YOUNGER  GRATTAN.  353 

second  son  of  the  great  Irishman,  of  whom  it  may  be  so  justly- 
said  : — 

"  Magnum  et  venerabile  nomen, 
Gentibus,  et  nostrae  multum  quod  prodeat  urbi." 

His  father  took,  from  the  earliest  period,  the  most  anxious  care 
of  his  mind,  upon  which  he  set  a  high  value.  I  have  been 
assured  by  a  gentleman,  whose  authority  I  could  not  for  a 
moment  question,  that  the  late  Mr.  Grattan,  in  presenting  his 
son  to  his  tutor  at  Trinity  College,  expressed  his  conviction  of 
his  superior  qualifications,  and  said  that  he  hoped  to  leave 
"his  Henry"  as  a  noble  bequest  to  his  country.  The  great 
patriot  saw  in  the  mind  of  his  son  what  Doctor  Johnson  calls 
"  the  latent  possibilities  of  excellence ;"  and  he  was  anxious, 
as  well  from  a  national  as  from  a  parental  feeling,  to  bring 
them  forth.  Mr.  Henry  Grattan,  while  in  college,  enjoyed  the 
double  advantage  of  an  excellent  system  of  public  education, 
and  of  having  a  domestic  pattern  of  the  admirable  in  eloquence 
and  in  patriotism  perpetually  before  his  eyes.  His  career  in 
the  University  was  highly  honorable ;  and  in  the  Historical 
Society,  which,  if  it  were  not  a  school  of  genuine  oratory,  was 
at  all  events  a  useful  nursery  of  declamation,  obtained  univer- 
sal plaudits.  Having  taken  his  degrees  with  credit,  he  entered 
the  Temple,  and  went  through  the  usual  masticating  process, 
by  which  the  British  youth  are  initiated  into  the  mysteries  of 
the  law.  He  became,  while  in  London,  a  member  of  the 
society  called  "  The  Academic,"  which  holds  debates  upon  all 
the  entities,  and  distinguished  himself  by  a  force  and  strenu- 
ousness  of  elocution  to  which  that  debating  assocation  was  little 
accustomed.  Upon  his  return  to  Dublin,  after  having  gone 
through  his  two  years'  novitiate,  and  eaten  his  way  to  the  Bar, 
he  dedicated  himself  to  political  rather  than  to  forensic  pur- 
suits. His  illustrious  father  had  been  unkindly,  and,  in  my 
judgment,  ungratefully  treated  by  the  Irish  Catholics.  Mr. 
Henry  Grattan  resented  these  injuries  with  more  asperity  than 
it  was,  perhaps,  judicious  to  have  expressed,  and  involved 
himself  in  some  personal  altercations,  which  are  now  happily 
forgotten.  Having  a  turn  for  composition,  but  not  being  suf- 
ficiently versed  in  the  arts  of  vituperative  insinuation,  he  pub- 


354  DUBLIN    TABTNET   BALL. 

lished  one  or  two  articles  in  the  "Evening  Post,"  of  too  undis- 
guised a  kind,  against  tlie  Duke  of  Richmond,  which  produced 
a  prosecution  *  He  had  a  narrow  escape  from  the  fangs  of 
Mr.  Saurin,  and  was,  I  believe,  obliged  to  remunerate  the  pro- 
prietor of  the  newspaper  at  no  little  cost.  The  great  aggrava- 
tion of  his  satire  was  its  truth.  His  celebrated  father  was,  it 
is  understood,  a  good  deal  annoyed  by  the  results  of  these  fiist 
essays  in  invective,  which  obliged  him  to  pay  to  the  King  a 
portion  of  what  he  had  received  from  the  people. 

Until  his  death,  his  son  did  not  come  directly  forward  upon 
the  political  stage;  but  when  that  great  man  had  been  depos- 
ited in  Westminster  Abbey  (neither  Grattan  nor  Curran  is 
buried  in  Irish  earth),1  his  son  offered  himself  as  a  candidate 
for  the  representation  of  the  city  of  Dublin.  It  ought  to  have 
descended  to  him  as  an  inheritance.  He  appeared  on  the 
hustings  with  the  incomparable  services  of  his  illustrious  father 
as  his  advocate.  He  combined  with  the  legitimate  claims 
derived  from  so  illustrious  a  name  great  personal  merit.  Yet 
so  high  ran  the  prejudices  of  party,  that  Master  Ellis,  whose 
only  title  arose  from  his  hostility  to  the  Catholics,  was  pre- 
ferred to  him,  and  the  services  of  the  best  and  most  lofty- 
minded  Irishman  that  ever  lived  were  shamefully  forgotten. 
Painful  as  such  a  defeat  unquestionably  was,  he  did  not  relin- 
quish the   object    on   which   his  heart   was  set;    and  having 

*  The  Dublin  Evening  Post,  one  of  the  most  respectable  journals  of  Ireland, 
was  long  an  advocate  of  the  Catholic  party.  After  the  passing  of  the  Emanci- 
pation Bill,  in  1829,  it  became  the  organ  of  the  Government.  For  the  last 
thirty  years  it  was  edited  by  a  liberal  and  able  Protestant,  Frederick  William 
Conway;  who  died  in  1853. —  M. 

t  The  ashes  of  Curran  now  repose  in  the  land  which  he  loved  so  well,  and 
in  which  his  genius  and  patriotism  are  reverenced  as  they  deserve.  He  died 
on  the  14th  of  October,  1817,  and  was  buried  in  Paddington  Church,  London. 
In  1834,  it  was  determined  to  remove  his  remains  to  Ireland,  and  a  Committee, 
sitting  in  Dublin,  managed  the  details.  The  coffin  was  received  on  its  arrival 
by  Cunan's  son  and  another,  was  deposited  temporarily  in  the  mausoleum  at 
Lyons,  the  seat  of  Curran's  friend,  Lord  Cloncurry,  and  was  thence  taken  to 
Glasnevin  Cemetery,  where  it  lies  beneath  a  magnificent  monument  of  granite, 
on  the  model  of  the  tomb  of  Scipio,  on  which  is  carved  the  one  word  CURRAN 
which  is  sufficient  for  such  a  man. —  Grattan  was  buried  in  Westminister  Abbey, 
where  rests  all  that  was  mortal  of  many  illustrious  men. —  M, 


"the  tenth."  355 

Ascertained  that  a  number  of  Roman  Catholics  had  omitted  to 
register  their  freeholds,  by  his  own  personal  exertions,  and  by- 
individual  application,  he  created  such  a  counteraction  to  the 
suffrages  of  the  freemen,  that,  at  the  last  election,  he  was 
returned  for  the  city.  He  did  not,  at  the  same  time,  omit  any 
effort  to  disarm  the  corporators  of  their  prejudices,  and  by 
every  species  of  legitimate  assiduity  endeavored  to  charm  their 
antipathies  away.  He  accordingly  paid  t«  the  Orange  poten- 
tates of  the  Corporation  a  diligent  and  obsequious  attention. 

I  observed  him  actively  engaged  in  this  part  of  his  vocation 
at  the  Tabinet  Ball.     No  man  laughed  more  loudly  at  certain 

reminiscences  from  "  Joe  Miller,"  which  Alderman was 

pouring,  as  original  anecdotes,  into  his  ear.  The  new  and 
graceful  pleasantry  of  the  worthy  corporator  appeared  to  throw 
Mr.  Grattan  into  convulsions  of  merriment,  though  now  and 
then,  in  the  intervals  of  laughter,  I  could  perceive  an  expres- 
sion of  weariness  coming  over  his  face,  and  that  effort  over  the 
oscitating  organs,  with  which  an  incipient  yawn  is  smothered 
and  kept  in. 

My  attention  was  suddenly  diverted  from  this  political 
tete-a -tete,  by  an  ejaculation  of  ennui,  which  was  uttered  by  a 
young   English   officer,*  who   was   lounging,  with  two    of  his 

*  In  1823-'24,  a  cavalry  regiment  called  the  Tenth  Hussars,  formed  part  of  the 
garrison  of  Dublin.  Its  officers  were  chiefly,  if  not  wholly  members  of  aristocrat- 
ic families  in  England,  and  looked  down  with  unconcealed  contempt  upon  every 
grade  of  society  in  the  Irish  Metropolis.  They  condescended,  sometimes,  merely 
pour  passer  le  temps — to  partake  of  dinners  and  appear  at  balls  given  by  the 
"  natives"  in  Dublin.  Here  they  usually  conducted  themselves  on  the  "  Nil 
admirari"  principle,  and  showed  what  magnificent  ideas  of  their  own  impor- 
tance were  entertained  —  by  themselves.  On  one  occasion,  the  lady  of  the 
house  at  which  there  was  a  rout,  good-naturedly  asked  one  of  these  officers 
whether  she  should  introduce  him  to  a  charming  partner  for  a  quadrille  ?  The 
reply,  delivered  with  a  pause  between  each  word,  was,  "  Thank  you,  but,  the 
Tenth  don't  daunce  !"  Another  time,  an  Irish  peeress  told  one  of  these  carpet- 
knights  that  a  lovely  young  woman  near  him  was  heiress  to  an  immense  for- 
tune, and  asked  if  he  would  not  like  to  make  her  acquaintance,  and  try  to  win 
the  prize  ?  "  I'm  not  a  marrying  man,  myself,"  was  the  reply,  "  but,  I  shall 
mention  her  at  mess  !" — The  excellent  comedy  (by  Croly,  the  poet  and  divine), 
called,  "  Pride  shall  have  a  Fall,"  in  which  a  party  of  puppy-officers  are  intro- 
duced and  ridiculed,  owed  some  of  its  success  to  its  presumed  intention  of 
satirizing  "  The  Tenth."— M. 


356  DUBLIN    TABINET   BALL. 

military  compatriots,  through  tlie  room.  This  triumvirate  of 
coxcombs  trailed  themselves,  with  an  affected  listlessness, 
along,  and  vented  their  depreciation  of  Ireland  in  elaborately 
English  intonations.  They  were  apparently  anxious  to  give 
intimation  of  their  superior  country ;  for  they  put  more  of 
their  national  accent  into  their  voices  than  well-bred  English- 
men are  accustomed  to  do,  and  seemed  vain  of  the  anti-Irish 
drawl,  in  which  the  spirit  of  mingled  tedium  and  of  derision 
was  expressed. 

One  of  them  was  a  handsome  and  well-formed  fellow,  the 
manliness  of  whose  person  made  a  singular  contrast  with  the 
artificial  effeminacy  with  which  his  countenance  was  invested. 
He  lisped  in  a  deep  guttural  voice,  and  played  with  his  whiskers 
as  if  they  were  the  bow-strings  of  Cupid.  I  was  not  a  little 
amused  by  the  languid  complacency  with  which  this  athletic 
Narcissus  seemed  to  contemplate  himself.  His  companion  on 
the  right,  was  the  exact  reverse  of  the  captain  in  manner  and 
in  aspect;  for,  with  a  feeble  and  fragile  form,  and  the  cheek 
of  a  woman,  he  put  on  an  air  of  warlike  defiance,  and  looked 
as  Madame  Vestris  would  in  the  part  of  Pistol.  The  other 
was  a  huge  booby  in  gold  and  scarlet,  with  great  meanless 
eyes  falling  out  of  their  sockets,  and  with  features  thrown  in  a 
chaos  together. 

His  business  appeared  to  be  to  grin  at  the  captain's  wit,  and 
turn  up  a  pair  of  dilated  nostrils,  through  which  he  snorted  his 
disdain  of  Ireland.  These  gentlemen  were  joined  by  an  old 
officer,  who  was  evidently  a  man  of  rank,  before  whom  they 
immediately  assumed  an  aspect  of  deference  :  like  themselves 
he  was  an  Englishman,  but  of  a  very  different  sort.  He.  had 
the  marks  of  long  service  on  his  face,  which  was  of  a  strongly 
martial  cast.  There  was  no  exhibition  of  haughty  fierceness 
in  his  air;  but  his  fine  intelligent  eye  had  that  calm  intensity 
of  observation  which  denotes  the  "  coup-d'oeil  militaire"  His 
features  were  aquiline,  his  color  was  tinged  by  the  Spanish 
sun,  and  his  physiognomy  united  great  natural  sweetness  of 
expression  with  the  familiar  habits  of  command.  He  said  that 
he  had  been  greatly  delighted  with  all  that  he  had  seen,  and 
had  no  notion  that  Dublin  could  produce  such  a  display  o^ 


MISS   O'CONNELL.  35? 

elegance,  opulence,  and  beauty.  He  rallied  Lis  young  friends 
upon  the  loss  of  their  hearts,  and  the  likelihood  of  their  carry- 
ing back  Irish  wives  to  England.  Against  the  possibilities  of 
such  a  misadventure  in  matrimony  they  vehemently  protested, 
and  enlarged  upon  the  huge  feet  and  monstrosities  of  ankle 
exhibited  by  the  Irish  fair. 

A  ponderous  lady,  the  wife  of  an  honest  burgher,  was 
bouncing  at  the  moment  through  the  mazes  of  the  third  set, 
and  seemed  to  be  in  that  interesting  condition  which  a  lady 
of  fashion,  in  "The  Vicar  of  Wakefield,"  describes  as  being 
"  all  over  in  a  muck  of  sweat."  To  make  the  matter  worse, 
she  took  it  into  her  head  that  the  officers  had  selected  her  as 
an  object  of  admiration;  and  throwing  a  look  of  greasy  ama- 
tiveness  into  her  face,  renewed  her  efforts  at  the  graceful  with 
a  desperate  agility.  I  felt  some  mortification  at  the  oppor- 
tunity for  ridicule,  which  was  afforded  to  the  young  English- 
men by  this  piece  of  animated  corpulency;  but  I  was  relieved 
by  the  elder  officer,  who  pointed  to  a  young  lady  in  an  adjoin- 
ing circle  of  dancers,  whom  it  was  only  necessary  to  look  at 
for  an  instant,  in  order  to  feel  the  influence  which  perfect 
beauty  will  create  in  the  rudest  mind.  With  all  their  disposi- 
tion to  find  fault,  the  party  of  military  critics  at  once  admitted 
that  the  taste  of  the  old  colonel  could  not  be  impeached,  and 
that  such  a  face  and  figure  would  almost  justify  the  violation 
of  the  regimental  rule,  "not  to  marry  in  Ireland." 

The  impression  produced  by  the  girl  whom  the  venerable 
veteran  had  selected,  diverted  my  attention  from  the  com- 
mentaries of  the  English  officers.  Though  not  tall,  her  figure 
had  the  perfection  of  youthful  symmetry.  Her  limbs  were  of 
the  finest  mould,  and  with  the  round  plumpness  of  health, 
united  an  aerial  lightness  and  grace.  The  beautiful  epithet 
which  Prospero  applies  to  the  sweet  minister  of  his  spells, 
seemed  to  belong  to  this  fascinating  person,  who  looked  as 
"  delicate"  as  Ariel.  Her  dress  was  simple :  it  consisted 
merely  of  a  pink  tabinet,  without  decoration.  A  wreath  of 
flowers  bound  the  black  hair,  the  ringlets  of  which  just  shaded 
the  marble  of  her  forehead,  but  fell  in  "ambrosial  plenty" 
behind.      Her  features,  although  somewhat  minute,  had    the 


358  DUBLIN   TABINET   BALL. 

Siddonian  character.  Thought  and  sensibility  were  mingled 
like  the  white  and  red  roses  in  her  cheek.  Her  eyes  were  of 
the  finest  black ;  but,  although  they  were  both  sweet  and  bril- 
liant, there  was  an  expression  about  them  which  I  was  at  first 
at  some  loss  to  define.  I  afterward  perceived  that  it  arose 
merely  from  a  shortness  of  sight.  I  could  have  remained,  as 
Oroonoko  says,  gazing  "  whole  nights"  upon  her,  when  happily, 
perhaps,  for  as  much  heart  as  yet  abides  within  me,  her  chape- 
ron warned  her,  at  the  conclusion  of  the  dance,  that  it  was 
time  to  retire.  The  morning,  indeed,  had  just  begun  to  show 
a  face  scarcely  more  beautiful,  and,  as  if  jealous  of  such  a  rival 

as  Miss  O'O ,  admonished  her  to  depart.*     She  drew  her 

shawl  round  her  bosom,  with  a  grace  which  Oanova  should 
have  turned  to  marble,  and  disappeared  amidst  the  crowd  who 
were  pouring  out  of  the  room.  I  remained  for  some  moments 
in  that  state  of  revery,  which,  in  my  younger  days,  I  mistook 
for  romance,  with  the  image  of  the  lady  before  me.  I  was 
roused  from  my  dream,  however,  by  the  recollection  that  I  was 
past  thirty,  and  that  it  was  five  o'clock.  The  company  were 
gone.  I  stood  alone,  where  hundreds  had  recently  met  in  a 
joyous  and  brilliant  concourse ;  and  I  felt  how  justly,  as  well 
as  beautifully,  Moore  has  compared  the  recollections  of  our 
youth  to  the  sensations  of  one 

"  Who  treads  alone 
Some  banquet-hall  deserted, 
Whose  lights  are  fled, 
Whose  garlands  dead, 
And  all  but  he  departed; — 
Thus  in  the  stilly  night,  ere  slumber's  chain  has  bound  me, 
Sad  memory  brings  the  light  of  other  days  around  me." 

*  I  have  reason  to  believe  that  the  lady,  whose  portrait  is  thus  beautifully 
painted  in  words,  was  a  daughter  of  Mr.  O'Connell.  At  that  time,  she  was  in 
the  pride  of  youth  and  loveliness.  All  of  O'Connell's  children  were  well-look- 
ing; his  daughters  were  remai^kable  for  their  personal  attractions. —  M 


CATHOLIC  LEADERS  AND  ASSOCIATIONS 

I  now  propose  to  give  some  account  of  the  various  bodies 
which  have  successively  managed  the  concerns  of  the  Catho- 
lics, and  of  the  individuals  who  have  taken  the  most  active 
part  in  their  affairs.* 

Catholic  Associations  have  been  of  very  long  existence.  The 
Confederates  of  1642  were  the  precursors  of  the  Association  of 
1828.  The  Catholics  entered  into  a  league  for  the  assertion 
of  their  civil  rights.  They  opened  their  proceedings  in  the 
city  of  Kilkenny,  where  the  house  is  shown  in  which  their  as- 
semblies were  held.  They  established  two  different  bodies  to 
represent  the  Catholic  people — namely,  a  general  .assembly, 
and  a  supreme  council.  The  first  included  all  the  lords,  pre- 
lates, and  gentry,  of  the  Catholic  body  ;  and  the  latter  con- 
sisted of  a  few  select  members,  chosen  by  the  general  assembly 
out  of  the  different  provinces,  who  acted  as  a  kind  of  executive, 
and  were  recognised  as  their  supreme  magistrates.  These 
were  "the  Confederates."  Carte,  in  his  "Life  of  Ormonde," 
calls  them  "an  Association."  He  adds  that  the  first  result  of 
their  union  was  an  address  to  the  King  [Charles  I.],  in  which 
they  demanded  justice,  and  besought  him  "timely  to  assign  a 
place  where  they  might  with  safety  express  their  grievances." 
On  receiving  this  address,  the  King  issued  a  commission  under 
the  great  seal,  empowering  the  commissioners  to  treat  with  the 

*  This  sketch,  full  of  historical  and  personal  interest,  appeared  in  October, 
1828,  and  was  marked  "To  be  continued" — an  unfulfilled  promise,  probably 
caused  by  Mr.  Sheil's  "  invasion  of  Kent"  (immediately  after  it  was  written), 
us  related  in  the  next  volume. —  M. 


360  CATHOLIC   LEADERS. 

Confederates,  to  receive  in  writing  what  they  had  to  say  or 
propound,  and  to  transmit  it  to  his  Majesty. 

This  commission  was  dated  the  11th  of  January,  1642.  Or- 
monde says,  in  one  of  his  letters,  that  "the  Lords  Justices 
usedt  every  endeavor  to  prevent  the  success  of  the  commission, 
and  to  impede  the  pacification  of  the  country."  The  supreme 
council  of  "  the  Confederates"  was  sitting  at  Ross,  and  a  de- 
spatch was  transmitted  by  the  Lords  Justices  to  them,  in  which 
the  phrase  "  odious  rebellion"  was  applied  to  their  proceedings. 
At  this  insult  they  took  fire  —  they  had  arms  in  their  hands, 
and  returned  an  answer,  in  which  they  stated  that  "  it  would 
be  a  meanness  beyond  expression  in  them  who  fought  in  the 
condition  of  loyal  subjects,  to  come  in  the  repute  of  rebels  to 
set  down  their  grievances.  We  take  God  to  witness,"  added 
they,  "  that  there  are  no  limits  set  to  the  scorn  and  infamy  that 
are  cast  upon  us,  and  we  will  be  in  the  esteem  of  loyal  sub- 
jects, or  die  to  a  man  !"  A  terrible  civil  war  ensued.  On  the 
28th  of  July,  1646,  Lord  Digby  published  a  proclamation  of 
peace  with  the  Confederates.  The  Pope's  Nuncio,  Renuccini, 
induced  the  former  to  reject  the  terms.  The  Avar  raged  on. 
At  length,  in  1648,  Ormonde  concluded  a  treaty  with  them  ; 
but,  soon  after,  Cromwell  landed  in  Ireland,  and  crushed  the 
Catholics  to  the  earth. 

Thus  an  early  precedent  of  a  Catholic  Association  is  to  be 
found  at  the  distance  of  upward  of  a  hundred  and  eighty-six 
years.  I  pass  over  the  events  of  the  Revolution.  The  penal 
code  was  enacted.  From  the  Revolution  to  the  reign  of  George 
II.,  the  Catholics  were  so  depressed  and  abject,  that  they  did 
not  dare  to  petition,  and  their  very  silence  was  frequently  the 
subject  of  imputation,  as  affording  evidence  of  a  discontented 
and  dissatisfied  spirit.  Upon  the  accession  of  George  II.,  in 
1727,  Lord  Delvin,  and  the  principal  of  the  Roman  Catholic 
gentry,  presented  a  servile  address,  to  be  laid  by  the  Lords 
Justices  before  the  throne.  They  were  in  a  condition  so  ut- 
terly despicable  and  degraded,  that  not  even  an  answer  was 
returned.  But  Primate  Boulter,  who  was  a  shrewd  and  saga- 
cious master  of  all  the  arts  of  colonial  tyranny,  in  a  letter  to 
Lord  Carteret,  intimates  his  apprehension  at  this  first  act  since 


THE    CATllOLTC    COMMITTEE.  361 

the  Revolution,  of  the  Catholics  as  a  community  ;  and  imme- 
diately after  they  were  deprived  of  the  elective  franchise  by 
the  1st  George  II.,  ch.  9,  sec.  7.  The  next  year  came  a  bill 
which  was  devised  by  Primate  Boulter,  to  prevent  Roman 
Catholics  from  acting  as  solicitors. 

Here  we  find,  perhaps,  the  origin  of  the  Catholic  rent.  Sev- 
eral Catholics  in  Cork  and  Dublin  raised  a  subscription  to  de- 
fray the  expense  of  opposing  the  bill,  and  an  apostate  priest 
gave  information  of  this  conspiracy  (for  so  it  was  called)  to 
bring  in  the  Pope  and  the  Pretender.  The  transaction  was 
referred  to  a  committee  of  the  House  of  Commons,  who  actu- 
ally reported  that  five  pounds  had  been  collected,  and  resolved 
that  "  it  appeared  to  them  that,  under  pretence  of  opposing 
heads  of  bills,  sums  of  money  had  been  collected,  and  a  fund 
established  by  the  Popish  inhabitants  of  this  kingdom,  highly 
detrimental  to  the  Protestant  interest." 

These  were  the  first,  efforts  of  the  Roman  Catholics  to  obtain 
relief,  or  rather  to  prevent  the  imposition  of  additional  burdens. 
They  did  not,  however,  act  through  the  medium  of  a  commit- 
tee or  association.  It  was  in  the  year  1757,  upon  the  appoint- 
ment of  the  Duke  of  Bedford  to  the  viceroyalty  of  Ireland, 
that  a  Committee  was  for  the  first  time  formed,  of  which  the 
great  model,  perhaps,  was  to  be  discovered  in  "the  Confeder- 
ates" of  1642  ;  and  ever  since  that  period  the  affairs  of  the 
body  have  been  more  or  less  conducted  through  the  medium 
of  assemblies  of  a  similar  character.  The  Committee  of  1757 
may  be  justly  accounted  the  parent  of  the  great  Convention 
which  has  since  brought  its  enormous  seven  millions  into  ac- 
tion. The  members  of  the  Committee  formed  in  that  year  were 
delegated  and  actually  chosen  by  the  people.  They  were  a 
Parliament  invested  with  all  the  authority  of  representation. 
Their  first  assembly  was  held  in  a  tavern  called  "  The  Globe," 
in  Essex  street,  Dublin.  After  some  sittings,  Mr.  Wyse,  of 
Waterford,  the  ancestor  of  the  gentleman  who  has  lately  made 
so  conspicuous  a  figure  in  Catholic  politics,  proposed  a  plan  of 
more  extended  delegation,  which  was  at  once  adopted.  1 1 
1759,  this  body  was  brought  into  recognition  by  the  state;  for, 
upon  the  alarm  of  the  invasion  of  Conflans,  the  Roman  Catho- 

Vol.  I.  — 16  .     .   .    ,„ 


362  CATHOLIC   LEAJ3EKS. 

lie  Committee  prepared  a  loyal  address,  which  was  presented 
to  John  Ponsonby,  the  then  Speaker,  by  Messrs.  Crump  and 
M'Dermot,  two  delegates,  to  be  transmitted  by  him  to  the 
Lord-Lieutenant.  A  gracious  answer  to  this  address  was  re- 
turned, and  published  in  the  "  Gazette."  The  Speaker  sum 
moned  the  two  delegates  to  the  House  of  Commons,  and  the 
address  was  then  read.  Mr.  M'Dermot,  in  the  name  of  his 
body,  thanked  the  Speaker  for  his  condescension. 

This  was  the  first  instance  in  which  the  political  existence 
of  the  Irish  Catholics  was  acknowledged,  through  the  medium 
of  their  Committee.  This  recognition,  however,  was  not  fol- 
lowed by  any  immediate  relaxation  of  the  penal  code.  Twelve 
years  elapsed  before  any  legislative  measure  was  introduced 
which  indicated  a  more  favorable  disposition  toward  the  Cath- 
olic community,  if,  indeed,  the  11th  and  12th  of  George  III. 
can  be  considered  as  having  conferred  any  boon  upon  that  de- 
graded people.  The  statute  was  entitled,  "  An  act  for  the 
reclaiming  of  unprofitable  bogs;"  and  it  enabled  Papists  to 
take  fifty  acres  of  unprofitable  bog  for  sixty-one  years,  with 
half  an  acre  of  arable  land  adjoining,  provided  that  it  should 
not  be  within  one  mile  of  a  town.  The  provisions  of  this  act 
of  Parliament  indicate  to  what  a  low  condition  the  great  mass 
of  the  population  had  been  reduced,  and  illustrate  the  justice 
of  Swift's  remark,  that  the  Papists  had  become  mere  hewers 
of  wood  and  drawers  of  water.  However,  the  first  step  was 
taken  in  the  progress  of  concession ;  and  every  day  the  might 
of  numbers,  even  destitute  of  all  territorial  possession,  pressed 
more  and  more  upon  the  Government. 

The  Catholic  Committee  pursued  its  course,  and  in  1777  ex- 
torted the  first  important  relaxation ;  for  they  acquired  the 
right  of  taking  leases  for  nine  hundred  and  ninety-nine  years, 
and  their  landed  property  was  made  descendible  and  devisa- 
ble, in  the  same  manner  as  Protestant  estates.  In  1782,  the 
difficulties  of  the  Government  augmented,  and  the  Catholic 
Committee  pressed  the  consideration  of  their  claims  upon  the 
Ministry.  By  the  21st  and  22d  of  George  III.,  Papists  were 
enabled  to  purchase  and  dispose  of  landed  property,  and  were 
placed,  in  that  respect,  upon   an   equality   with  Protestants. 


THE   CATHOLIC    COMMITTEE.  363 

Thus  they  were  rashly  left  beyond  the  state,  hut  were  furnished 
with  that  point  from  which  the  engiue  of  their  power  has  been 
since  wielded  against  it. 

From  1782  until  1793,  no  further  concessions  were  made  ;  but 
the  Catholics  increased  in  power,  until,  in  1792,  their  Com 
mittee  assumed  a  formidable  aspect.  Theobald  Wolfe  Ton?,, 
in  his  Memoirs,  gives  the  following  account  of  what  may  be 
called  the  Association  of  that  period  :  "  The  General  Commit- 
tee of  the  Catholics,  which,  since  the  year  1792,  has  made  a 
distinguished  figure  in  the  politics  of  Ireland,  was  a  bod}7  com- 
posed of  their  bishops,  their  country  gentlemen,  and  of  a  cer- 
tain number  of  merchants  and  traders,  all  resident  in  Dublin, 
but  named  by  the  Catholics  in  the  different  towns  corporate  to 
represent  them.  The  original  object  of  this  institution  was  to 
obtain  the  repeal  of  a  partial  and  oppressive  tax  called  Quar- 
terage, which  was  levied  on  the  Catholics  only ;  and  the 
Government,  which  found  the  Committee  at  first  a  convenient 
instrument  on  some  occasions,  connived  at  their  existence.  So 
degraded  was  the  Catholic  mind  at  the  period  of  the  forma- 
tion of  their  Committee,  and  long  after,  that  they  were  happy 
to  be  allowed  to  go  up  to  the  Castle  with  an  abominable  slavish 
address  to  each  successive  Viceroy  ;  of  which,  moreover,  until 
the  accession  of  the  Duke  of  Portland  in  1782,  so  little  notice 
was  taken,  that  his  Grace  was  the  first  who  condescended  to 
give  them  an  answer  [N.  B.  this  is  a  mistake] ;  and,  indeed, 
for  above  twenty  years,  the  sole  business  of  the  general  Com- 
mittee was  to  prepare  and  deliver  in  those  records  of  their 
depression.  The  effort  which  an  honest  indignation  had  called 
forth  at  the  time  of  the  Volunteer  Convention  of  17S3,  seemed 
to  have  exhausted  their  strength,  and  they  sunk  back  into 
their  primitive  nullity.  Under  this  appearance  of  apathy,  how- 
ever a  new  spirit  was  gradually  arising  in  the  body,  owing 
principally  to  the  exertions  and  the  example  of  one  man,  John 
Keogh,  to  whose  services  his  country,  and  more  especially  the 
Catholics,  are  singularly  indebted.  In  fact,  the  downfall  of 
feudal  tyranny  was  acted  in  little  on  the  theatre  of  the  General 
Committee.  The  influence  of  their  clergy  and  of  their  barons 
was  gradually  undermined  ;    and  the  third  estate,  the  com- 


364  CATHOLIC   LEADERS. 

mercial  interest,  rising  in  wealth  and  power,  was  preparing,  by 
degrees,  to  throw  oft'  the  yoke,  in  the  imposing,  or  at  le^st 
continuing  of  which,  the  leaders  of  the  body,  I  mean  the  pre- 
lates and  the  aristocracy,  to  their  disgrace  be  it  spoken,  were 
ready  to  concur.  Already  had  those  leaders,  acting  in  obedi- 
ence to  the  orders  of  the  Government,  which  held  them  in 
fetters,  suffered  one  or  two  signal  defeats  in  the  Committee, 
owing  principally  to  the  talents  and  address  of  John  Keogh  : 
the  parties  began  to  be  defined,  and  a  sturdy  democracy  of 
new  men,  with  bolder  views  and  stronger  talents,  soon  super- 
seded the  timid  counsels  and  slavish  measures  of  the  ancient 
aristocracy." 

Until  John  Keogh  appeared  among  them,  and  asserted  that 
superiority  in  public  assemblies  which  genius  and  enterprise 
will  always  obtain  over  the  sluggish  pride  of  inert  and  apathe- 
tic rank,  the  proceedings  of  the  Committee  had  been,  as  Tone 
here  intimates,  under  the  control  of  the  Catholic  aristocracy. 
They  were  the  sons  of  men  who  had  lived  in  the  period  of 
utter  Catholic  degradation ;  and  many  of  them  remembered 
the  time  when  the  privileges  of  a  gentleman  were  denied  to  a 
Catholic  nobleman,  and  a  Popish  peer  was  not  allowed  to  wear 
a  sword  !  They  had  contrived  to  retain  their  properties  by 
expedients  which  were  calculated  to  debase  their  political 
spirit;  and  it  is  not  very  wonderful  that  even  when  the  period 
had  arrived  when  they  might  hold  themselves  erect,  they  did 
not  immediately  divest  themselves  of  that  stoop,  which  the 
long  habit  of  bearing  burthens  had  of  necessity  given. 

Accordingly,  they  opposed  the  measures  of  a  bold  and  ad- 
venturous character,  which  the  plebeian  members  of  the  Com- 
mittee had  suggested ;  and  at  last  adopted  the  preposterous 
expedient  of  seceding  from  the  body.  Wolfe  Tone,  who  was 
secretary  to  the  Committee,  and  whose  evidence  is  of  great 
value,  gives  the  following  account  of  this  incident : — "  The 
Catholics,"  he  says,  "  were  rapidly  advancing  in  political  spirit 
and  information.  Every  month,  every  day,  as  the  Revolution 
in  France  went  prosperously  forward,  added  to  their  courage 
and  their  force,  and  the  hour  seemed  at  last  arrived  when,  after 
a  dreary  oppression  of  above  one  hundred  years,  they  were 


THE    CATHOLIC    ARISTOCRACY".  365 

once  more  to  appear  in  the  political  theatre  of  their  country. 
They  saw  the  brilliant  prospect  of  success,  which  events  in 
France  open  to  their  view,  and  they  determined  to  avail  them- 
selves with  promptitude  of  that  opportunity  which  never 
returns  to  those  who  omit  it.  For  this,  the  active  members  of* 
the  General  Committee  resolved  to  set  on  foot  an  immediate 
application  to  Parliament,  praying  for  a  repeal  of  the  penal 
laws. 

"The  first  difficulty  they  had  to  surmount  arose  in  their  own 
body ;  their  peers,  their  gentry,  as  they  affected  to  call  them- 
selves, and  their  prelates,  either  reduced  or  intimidated  by 
Government,  gave  the  measure  all  possible  opposition;  and,  at 
length,  after  a  long  contest,  in  which  both  parties  strained 
every  nerve,  and  produced  the  whole  of  their  strength,  the 
question  was  decided  on  a  division  in  the  Committee,  by  a 
majority  of  at  least  six  to  one,  in  favor  of  the  intended  appli- 
cation. The  triumph  of  the  young  democracy  was  complete; 
but,  though  the  aristocracy  was  defeated,  they  were  not  yet 
entirely  broken  down.  By  the  instigation  of  Government, 
they  had  the  meanness  to  secede  from  the  General  Committee, 
to  disown  their  acts,  and  even  to  publish  in  the  papers,  that 
they  did  not  wish  to  embarrass  the  Government,  by  advancing 
their  claims  of  emancipation. 

"  It  ra  difficult  to  conceive  such  a  degree  of  political  degrada- 
tion. But  what  will  not  the  tyranny  of  an  execrable  system 
produce  in  time  ?  Sixty-eight  gentlemen,  individually  of  high 
spirit,  were  found,  who  publicly,  and  in  a  body,  deserted  their 
party,  and  their  own  just  claims,  and  even  sanctioned  this 
pitiful  desertion  by  the  authority  of  their  signatures.  Such  an 
effect  had  the  operation  of  the  penal  laws  on  the  Catholics  of 
Ii eland,  as  proud  a  race  as  any  in  all  Europe  !" 

The  secession  of  the  aristocracy  did  not  materially  enfeeble 
the  people.  New  exertions  were  made  by  the  democracy.  A 
plan  of  more  general  and  faithful  representation  was  devised 
by  Mr.  M'Keon,  which  converted  the  Committee  into  a  com- 
plete Catholic  parliament.  Members  were  elected  for  every 
county  in  Ireland,  and  regularly  came  to  Dublin  to  attend  the 
meetings  of  this  extraordinary  convention.     At  the  head  of 


366  CATHOLIC    LEADERS. 

this  assembly  was  tlie  individual  of  whom  Wolfe  Tone  makes 
such  honorable  mention,  John  Keogh. 

He  was,  in  the  years  1792  and  1793,  the  unrivalled  leader 
of  the  Catholic  body.  He  belonged  to  the  middle  class  of  life, 
and  kept  a  silk-mercer's  shop  in  Parliament  street,  where  he 
had  accumulated  considerable  wealth.  His  education  had 
corresponded  with  his  original  rank,  and  he  was  without  the 
graces  and  refinements  of  literature ;  but  he  had  a  vigorous 
and  energetic  mind,  a  great  command  of  pure  diction,  a  striking 
and  simple  earnestness  of  manner,  great  powers  of  elucidation, 
singular  dexterity,  and  an  ardent,  intrepid,  and  untameable 
energy  of  character.  His  figure  was  rather  upon  a  small  scale; 
but  he  had  great  force  of  countenance,  an  eye  of  peculiar  bril- 
liancy, and  an  expression  in  which  vehement  feelings  and  the 
deliberative  faculties  were  combined.  He  was  without  a  com- 
petitor in  the  arts  of  debate;  occasionally  more  eloquent 
speeches  were  delivered  in  the  Catholic  convention,  but  John 
Keogh  was  sure  to  carry  the  measure  which  he  had  proposed, 
however  encountered  with  apparently  superior  powers  cf  decla- 
mation. 

Wolfe  Tone  has  greatly  praised  him  in  several  passages  of 
his  wrork ;  but  there  are  occasional  remarks  in  the  diary  which 
was  kept  by  that  singular  person,  when  secretary  to  the  Catho- 
lic Committee,  in  which  statements  unfavorable  to  John  K.^ogh 
are  expressed.  This  diary  was  never  intended  for  publication, 
and  is  written  in  a  very  easy  and  familiar  style.  He  calls 
John  Keogh  by  the  name  of  "  Gog,"  and  represents  him  as 
exceedingly  subtle,  dexterous,  and  cunning,  and  anxious  to 
such  an  extent  to  do  everything  himself,  as  to  oppose  good 
measures  when  they  were  suggested  by  others.  He  might 
have  had  this  fault,  but  as  Wolfe  Tone  wrote  down  the 
ephemeral  impressions  which  were  made  upon  him  by  occa- 
sional incidents  in  his  journal,  it  is  more  reasonable  to  look  at 
the  general  result  of  the  observations  on  this  able  man,  which 
are  to  be  found  in  his  autobiography,  than  to  the  remarks 
which  were  committed  every  day  to  his  tablets.  As  secretary 
to  the  Catholics,  he  was  himself  liable  to  be  sometimes  thwarted 
by  Mr.  Keogh  ;   and  it  is  likely  that,  under  the  influence  of 


JOHN    KEOGH.  367 

aome  small  annoyances,  lie  lias  set  down  in  his  journal  some 
strictures  upon  Ills  friend. 

Afterward,  however, -when  Wolfe  Tone  was  in  France,  he 
reverts,  in  the  diary  subsequently  kept  by  him,  to  John  Keogh, 
and,  when  far  away,  voluntarily  writes  a  high  encomium  upon 
the  leader  of  the  Irish  Catholics.  It  is  to  be  collected  from 
his  work,  that  John  Keogh  had  a  deep  hostility  to  England, 
and  that  he  was  disposed  to  favor  the  enterprise  of  Wolfe 
Tone.  However,  he  did  not,  in  Ireland,  escape  the  usual 
charges  of  corruption.  In  the  year  1793,  he  negotiated  with 
the  Minister  the  terms  upon  which  the  partial  emancipation, 
which  was  then  granted  to  the  Catholics,  was  to  be  conceded. 

Whenever  a  leader  of  the  people  is  brought  into  contact 
with  authority,  he  will  incur  injurious  surmises,  should  the 
result  not  correspond  with  popular  expectation.  It  was  said, 
that  had  John  Keogh  insisted  upon  complete  emancipation, 
everything  would,  in  that  moment  of  emergency,  have  been 
obtained.  It  was  insinuated,  and  for  a  long  time  believed, 
that  he  received  a  large  sum  of  money  as  a  remuneration  for 
his  complaisance;  but  there  is  no  sort  of  proof  that  he  sold  his 
country,  and  his  opulence  should,  by  generous  men,  who  are 
slow  to  believe  in  the  degradation  of  human  nature,  be  rather 
referred  to  his  honorable  industry  in  his  trade,  than  to  any 
barter  of  the  liberties  of  Ireland.  It  is  difficult  to  determine 
whether,  if  the  Catholics  had  been  peremptory  in  their  requi- 
sition for  equality,  they  could  have  forced  the  Minister  to 
yield.  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  they  would  have  encoun- 
tered obstacles  in  the  mind  of  the  late  King,*  which  could  not 

The  Legislative  Union  of  Ireland  was  the  favorite  measure  of  William  Pitt. 
To  the  Irish  Catholics,  he  held  out  hopes,  nearly  as  strong  as  promises,  that  the 
aholition  of  their  political  disabilities  would  follow.  George  III.,  who  was  cog- 
nizant, all  through,  of  this  understanding  with  the  Catholics,  was  decidedly 
averse  to  concession,  when  the  measure  was  named  to  him,  whereupon  Pitt 
quitted  office  in  disgust.  Three  years  after,  he  returned  to  power,  and  died  in 
January,  1806.  "All  The  Talents,"  comprising  Lord  Grenville's  Ministry,  in 
1807,  vainly  essayed  to  change  the  King's  Anti-Catholic  views  (he  thought  thai 
concession  to  the  Catholics  would  be  a  breach  of  his  coronation  oath  to  defer.d 
the  Protestant  Church)  and  very  soon  after  they  were  cavalierly  dismissed,  ana 
the  Perceval  Ministry  formed. — M. 


368  CATHOLIC    LEADERS. 

have  been  overcome;  and  it  must  be  acknowledged,  that  for 
what  was  obtained  (and  that  was  much),  his  country  is  princi- 
pally indebted  to  Mr.  Keogh,  and  to  the  Committee  of  which 
he  was  the  head. 

In  1793  the  elective  franchise  was  obtained.  The  seed  was 
then  cast,  of  which  we  have  seen  the  fruits  in  the  elections  of 
Waterford,  and  Louth,  and  Clare.  Great  joy  prevailed  through 
tlie  Catholic  body,  who  felt  that  they  had  now  gained,  for  the 
first  time,  a  footing  in  the  state,  and  were  armed  with  the 
power,  if  not  of  bursting  open,  of  at  least  knocking  loudly 
at  the  gates  of  the  constitution.  For  some  time  the  question 
lay  at  rest.  Tlie  rebellion  then  broke  out  —  the  Union  suc- 
ceeded—  and  the  Catholic  cause  was  forgotten.  It  was  not 
even  debated  in  the  British  House' of  Commons  until  the  year 
1S05,  when  the  measure  was  lost  by  an  immense  majority. 

John  Keogh,  being  advanced  in  life,  had  retired,  in  a  great 
degree,  from  public  proceedings,  and  confined  himself  to  his 
residence  at  Mount  Jerom,  in  the  vicinity  of  Dublin.  He  had 
been  previously  defeated  in  a  public  assembly  by  a  young  bar- 
rister, who  had  begun  to  make  a  figure  at  the  bar,  to  which  he 
was  called  in  the  year  1798,  and  who,  the  moment  lie  took  a 
part  in  politics,  made  a  commanding  impression.  This  barris- 
ter was  Daniel  O'Connell,  who,  in  overthrowing  the  previous 
leader  of  the  body  upon  a  question  connected  with  the  pro- 
priety of  persevering  to  petition  the  legislature,  gave  proof  of 
the  extraordinary  abilities  which  have  been  since  so  success- 
fully developed.  Mr.  Keogh  was  mortified,  but  his  infirmities, 
without  reference  to  any  pain  which  he  might  have  suffered, 
were  a  sufficient  inducement  to  retire  from  the  stage  where  he 
had  long  performed  the  principal  character  with  such  just 
applause.  Mr.  O'Connell  was,  however,  too  deeply,  engaged 
in  his  professional  pursuits  to  dedicate  as  much  of  his  atten- 
tion and  of  his  time  as  he  has  since  bestowed  to  political  con- 
cerns; and,  indeed,  the  writer  of  this  article  remembers  the 
time  when  his  power  of  public  speaking,  and  of  influencing 
popular  assemblies,  was  by  no  means  so  great  as  it  has  since 
become.  The  fortune  with  which  he  came  to  the  bar  (for  his 
father  and  uncle  were  then  alive)  was  not  considerable,  and  i* 


O'uoNNELi/s  anti-union  efforts.  369 

was  of  more  importance  to  him  to  accumulate  legal  knowledge 
and  pecuniary  resources  than  to  obtain  a  very  shining  political 
name.*  So  much  has  been  already  written  with  respect  to 
this  eminent  individual,  and  the  public  are  so  well  acquainted 
with  the  character  of  his  mind  and  talents,  that  it  is  not 
necessary  to  expatiate  upon  them. 

Another  person  appeared  after  the  secession  of  John  Keogh, 
of  very  great  abilities,  with  whose  name  the  English  public 
have  been  less  familiar.  Mr.  Denis  Scully,  the  eldest  son  of  a 
gentleman  of  large  property  in  the  County  of  Tipperary,  and 
who  had  been  called  to  the  bar,  obtained,  by  his  admirable 
writings,  an  influence  almost  equal  to  that  of  Mr.  O'Oonnell  in 
the  Catholic  Committee,  which  was  revived  in  all  its  vigor, 
and  became  the  object  of  Mr.  Saurin's  prosecutions  in  1811. 
Mr.  Scully  had,  upon  his  entrance  into  public  life,  written  some 
pamphlets  in  support  of  Government,  and  it  was  believed  that 
his  marriage  to  a  lady  who  was  related  to  Lady  Hardwicke 
had  given  a  determination  to  his  opinions.     When  Lord  Hard- 

*  O'Connell  did  not  join  the  United  Irishmen  in  )798,  when  he  was  aged 
twenty-three.  He  disapproved  of  their  "  argument  of  force,"  relying  rather  on 
the  "  force  of  argument."  It  is  said  that  he  even  became  member  of  a  yeo- 
manry corps.  Two  principles  he  started  with,  and  retained  to  the  end:-?- that 
he  who  committed  an  outrage  supplied  the  enemy  with  a  weapon  to  be  used 
against  the  country,  and  that  Ireland  could  not  be  prosperous  until  the  Legisla- 
tive Union  with  England  was  repealed.  The  "  Young  Ireland"  schism,  which 
bo  much  annoyed  him  at  the  close  of  his  career,  was  caused  by  his  continued 
resistance  to  the  doctrine 'bf  "physical  force"  held  by  Meagher,  Mitchel,  and 
others  of  the  young  and  gallant  patriots.  As  for  the  Union,  O'Connell'.?  first 
public  effort  was  against  it.  His  maiden  speech,  on  January  13,  1800,  was  at 
a  Catholic  meeting  in  Ireland,  and  in  unequivocal  condemnation  of  that  meas- 
ure. The  resolutions  of  this  meeting,  drawn  up  by  O'Connell,  declared  the 
Union,  then  proposed,  to  be  "  in  fact,  an  extinction  of  the  liberty  of  Ireland, 
which  would  be  reduced  to  the  abject  condition  of  a  province,  surrendered  to 
the  mercy  of  the  Minister  and  Legislature  of  another  country,  to  be  bound  by 
their  absolute  will,  and  taxed  at  their  pleasure  bylaws,  in  the  making  of  which 
Ireland  would  have  no  efficient  representation  whatever."  Ali  through  the 
struggle  for  Catholic  Emancipation,  and  to  the  last,  O'Connell  was  constant  in 
declaring  that  "the  Repeal"  must  he  the  end  of  all.  In  other  words,  from 
3  800  to  1847,  O'Connell  declared  that  there  must  be  a  Repeal  of  the  Union,  to 
make  Ireland 

"  Great,  glorious,  and  free  — 
First  flower  of  the  ear'.h  and  firit  gem  of  the  sea." — M. 

16* 


370  CATHOLIC    LEADERS. 

xvicke  was  in  Ireland,  Mr.  Scully  wis  a  good  deal  sought  for 
at  the  Castle.* 

His  first  writings,  however,  were  merely  juvenile  effusions  ; 
and  he  afterward  felt  that  the  only  means  of  obtaining  justice 
for  Ireland  was  by  awakening  a  deep  sense  of  their  injuries 
among  the  great  mass  of  the  people.  Accordingly  the  char- 
acter of  his  compositions  was  materially  changed ;  and  from 
ais  study  in  Merrion-'sqirare  there  issued  a  succession  of  pow- 
erful and  inflammatory  writings.  A  newspaper,  of  which  Mr. 
ZEneas  Mac  Donnel  was  named  the  editor,  was  established  by 
Mr.  O'Connell  and  Mr.  Scully;  and  both  those  gentlemen,  but 
especially  the  latter,  contributed  their  money  and  their  talents 
to  its  support.  The  wrongs  of  the  country  were  presented  in 
the  most  striking  view;  and  while  the  Government  looked 
with  alarm  on  these  eloquent  and  virulent  expositions  of  the 
condition  of  the  people,  the  people  were  excited  to  a  point  of 
discontent,  to  which  they  had  never  before  been  raised. 

Mi.  Scully  gained  great  influence  over  the  public  mind  by 
these  services.  His  work  upon  the  penal  code,  which  is  an 
admirable  digest  of  the  laws  and  of  their  results,  set  a  crown 
upon  his  reputation.  No  book  so  able,  so  convincing,  and 
uniting  so  much  philosophy  with  so  much  eloquence,  had  yet 
appeared.  It  brought  the  whole  extent  of  Catholic  suffering 
at  once  under  view,  and  condensed  and  concentrated  the  evils 
of  the  country,  This  work  created  an  unprecedented  impres- 
sion, and  gave  to  its  author  an  ascendency  in  the  councils  of 
the  Catholic  Committee.  He  was  greatly  inferior  to  Mr. 
O'Connell  as  a  speaker,  but  was  considered  fully  as  able  in 
preliminary  deliberation.  The  measures  of  the  body  were 
generally  believed  to  be  of  his  suggestion,  and  it  was  said  that 
he  had  gained  a  paramount-  influence  over  Mr.  O'Connell  him 
self.  "  The  witchery  resolutions,"  as  they  are  generally  des 
ignated  —  for  they  related  to  the  influence  of  an  enchantress 
of  fifty  over  the  Kingf  —  were  supposed  to  be  his  composi- 

*  The  third  Earl  of  Hardwicke,  horn  in  1757,  was  Lord  Lieutenant  of  Ireland 
from  1801  to  1806,  and  died  in  1834.— M. 

t  It  was  fondlv  anticipated  hy  the  Catholics  that,  whenever  the  Prince  of 
Wales   should  have   any  actual  power,  he  would  do  what  he   could    to   ohtairj 


THE   FATAL    WITCHERY.  371 

tion,  and  it  was  alleged  that  lie  omitted  no  efforts,  in  conjunc- 
tion with  the  late  Lord  Donoughmore,*  to  cause  them  to  be 

Emancipation.  In  1810,  when  George  III.  was  again  afflicted  with  insanity 
(from  which  he  never  recovered),  his  eldest  son  was  made  Prince  Regent,  to 
govern  in  his  father's  name,  but,  after  the  first  twelve  months,  with  all  but  the 
name  of  King.  He  retained  the  illiberal  rrr.'.ist-y,  headed  by  Mr.  Perceval,  and 
at  the  year's  end,  declared  that  he  would  j.jtaia  that.  Minister,  though  he  should 
be  glad  if  some  of  his  early  friends  would  join  the  government.  Lord  Grey 
and  Grenville,  whom  he  named,  declined.  1-n  nediately  after,  when  the  Assas- 
sination of  Perceval  rendered  a  new  ministry  necessary,  Grey  and  Grenville  were 
again  applied  to,  but  insisted  on  being  allowed,  at  starting,  to  change  the  en- 
tire household  of  the  Regent.  Sheridan,  who  supported  the  Regent  and  was 
much  in  his  confidence  then,  had  previously  written  in  their  name,  as  an  "  Ad- 
dress to  the  Prince,"  the  following  imitation  of  Rochester's  lines  to  Charles  II. : 
"  In  all  humility  we  crave, 

Our  Regent  may  become  our  slave; 

And,  being  so,  we  trust  that  he 

Will  thank  us  for  our  loyalty. 

Then,  if  he'll  help  us  to  pull  down 

His  father's  dignity  and  crown, 

We'll  make  him,  in  some  time  to  come, 

The  greatest  prince  in  Christendom." 

Lord  Liverpool,  a  strong  anti-Catholic,  was  made  Premier.  The  Irish  lead- 
ers then  passed  several  resolutions,  one  of  which  denounced  "  the  fatal  witch- 
ery" which  had  led  the  Regent  to  form  a  ministry  hostile  to  Irish  liberty  of  con- 
science. This  alluded  to  the  then  Marchioness  of  Hertford,  a  stout,  middle- 
aged  woman  (the  Regent's  first  wife  was  "  fat,  fair,  and  forty"),  and  was  a 
strong  Tory.  It  was  believed  that  she  was  the  Regent's  mistress,  while  his 
most  constant  male  friends  were  her  husband  and  son  —  the  latter  being  then 
nearly  forty  years  of  age !  These  "  witchery"  resolutions  so  much  annoyed 
the  Regent  that,  seventeen  years  elapsed  before,  under  strong  pressure,  he 
could  be  brought  to  consent  to  Catholic  Emancipation. —  M. 

*  Richard  Holy  Hutchinson,  born  1756,  was  son  of  that  Mr.  Hutchinson 
(provost  of  Trinity  College,  Dublin,  in  1761,  and  Irish  Secretary  of  State  in 
1777),  whose  thirst  of  acquisition  was  so  great  that  the  British  Minister  de- 
scribed him  as  one  who,  if  lie  obtained  Ireland  as  an  estate,  would  ask  for  the 
adjacent  Isle  of  Man,  as  a  kitchen  garden.  The  son  was  created  Baron, 
Viscount,  and  Earl,  and  was  made  a  British  Viscount  in  1821.  Dying  in  1825, 
he  was  succeeded  by  his  brother,  who  had  succeeded  Abercrombie  in  military 
command  in  Egypt,  and  had  been  created  Lord  Hutchinson,  in  1801,  with  a 
pension  of  two  thousand  pounds  sterling.  On  his  death,  in  1832,  his  nephev- 
became  Earl  of  Donoughmore,  but  had  won  a  loftier  fume,  in  1815,  by  assisting 
in  the  escape  of  Lavalette  from  the  prison  in  Paris,  where  certain  death  awaited 
him  from  the  vengeance  of  the  Bourbons.  During  the  present  century,  all  tbg 
Hu'  'hin-son  family  have  been  friends  of  civil  and  religious  liberty. —  M. 


372  CATHOLIC   LEADERS. 

carried.  The  resolutions  passed  at  the  "  Black  Abbey"  at 
Kilkenny  were  also  framed  by  Mr.  Scully,  who  narrowly 
escaped  incarceration  for  his  elucubrations. 

Mr.  John  Magee,  the  proprietor  of  the  Evening  Post,  and 
Mr.  Fitzpatrick,  were  impiisoned  for  his  sins;  but  I  have 
always  understood  that  Mr.  Scully  made  them  a  compensation 
for  their  sufferings  on  his  account.  He  became  an  object  of 
great  detestation  with  the  Pit. instant  party,  and  of  correspond- 
irg  partiality  with  his  own.  But,  in  the  height  of  his  political 
influence,  the  death  of  K*  father,  and  a  domestic  lawsuit, 
which  engrossed  all  his  mind,  induced  him  to  retire  in  a  great 
measure  from  public  life;  and  afterward  the  decay  of  health 
prevented  him  from,  taking  any  part  in  the  proceedings  of  his 
body. 

The  Catholics  have  sustained  a  great  loss  in  him.  His 
large  property,  his  indefatigable  industry,  his  profound  sense 
of  the  injustice  which  his  country  had  suffered,  and  the  elo- 
quent simplicity  with  which  he  gave  it  expression,  rendered 
him  adequate  to  the  part  which  had  devolved  upon  him.  His 
chief  fault  lay  in  the  intemperate  character  of  the  measures 
which  he  recommended.  His  manner  and  aspect  were  in  sin- 
gular contrast  and  opposition  to  his  political  tendencies.  In 
utterance  he  was  remarkably  slow  and  deliberate,  and  wanted 
energy  and  fire.  His  cadences  were  singularly  monotonous, 
every  sentence  ending  with  a  sort  of  see-saw  of  the  voice, 
which  was  by  no  means  natural  or  agreeable.  His  gesture 
was  plain  and  unaffected,  and  it  was  easier  to  discover  his 
emotions  by  the  trembling  of  his  fingers  than  by  his  counte- 
nance ;  for  his  hand  would,  under  the  influence  of  strong  feel- 
ing or  passion,  shake  and  quiver  like  an  aspen-leaf,  while  his 
countenance  looked  like  marble.  It  was  impossible  to  detect 
his  sensations  in  his  features.  A  deep  smile  played  over  his 
mouth,  whether  he  was  indulging  in  mirthful,  in  pleasurable, 
cr  sarcastic  observation.  He  had  some  resemblance  to  Bona- 
parte in  figure,  when  the  latter  grew  round  and  corpulent,  but 
was  more  unwieldy.  I  have  often  thought,  too,  that  in  his 
massive  and  meditative  features  I  could  trace  an  imperial 
likeness. 


LORDS    FRENCH    AJKD    FINGAL.  373 

It  was  about  sixteen  or  seventeen  years  ago  that  ch\$  gen- 
tleman made  so  distinguished  a  figure  in  the  Catholic  Com- 
mittee. There  were  many  others  who  at  that  time  took  an 
active  share  in  Catholic  politics,  and  who  are  since  either 
dead,  or  have  retreated  from  publicity.  The  late  Lord  French 
was  among  the  most  remarkable.  He  was  a  very  tall,  brawny, 
pallid,  and  ghastly-looking  man,  with  a  peculiarly  revolution- 
ary aspect,  and  realised  the  ideal  notions  which  one  forms  of 
the  men  who  are  most  likely  to  become  formidable  and  con- 
spicuous in  the  midst  of  a  political  convulsion.  He  had  a 
long  and  oval  visage,  of  which  the  eyebrows  were  thick  and 
shaggy,  and  whose  aquiline  nose  stood  out  in  peculiar  prom- 
inence, while  a  fierce  smile  sat  upon  cheeks  as  white  as  parch- 
ment, and  his  eyes  glared  with  the  spirit  that  sat  within  them. 
His  manners  were  characterized  by  a  sort  of  drawling  urbanity, 
which  is  observable  among  the  ancient  Catholic  gentry  of 
Connaught ;  and  he  was  studiously  and  sometimes  painfully 
polite.  He  was  not  a  scholar,  and  must  have  received  an 
imperfect  education.  But  his  mind  was  originally  a  powerful 
one,  and  his  deep  voice,  which  rolled  out  in  a  peculiarly  mel- 
ancholy modification  of  the  Irish  brogue,  had  a  dismal  and 
appalling  sound.  He  spoke  with  fluency  a  diction  which  be- 
longed exclusively  to  him.  It  was  pregnant  with  vigorous  but 
strange  expression,  which  was  illustrated  by  gesture  as  bold, 
but  as  wild.  He  was  an  ostentatious  duellist,  and  had  fre- 
quent recourse  to  gladiatorial  intimations.  Pride  was  his 
leading  trait  of  character,  and  he  fell  a  victim  to  it.  He  had 
connected  himself  with  a  bank  in  Dublin,  and  having  become 
bankrupt,  rather  than  brook  the  examination  of  the  commis- 
sioners at  the  Exchange,  he  put  himself,  in  a  paroxysm  of 
insanity,  to  death.  I  thought  him,  with  all  his  defects,  a  lover 
of  his  country. 

It  would  be  difficult  to  imagine  two  persons  more  stiongly 
opposite  in  character  and  in  manner  than  Lord  French  and 
the  Premier  Catholic  nobleman  the  Earl  of  Fingal.  He  has 
since  left  to  his  able  and  intelligent  son  the  office  which  he  so 
long  and  so  usefully  filled,  as  head  of  the  Catholic  body  ;  but. 
about  the  period  of  which  I  am  speaking,  he  was  the  chief,  in 


S?4  CATHOLIC   tKAtttffl. 

point  of  rank,  of  the  Irish  Catholics,  and  presided  at  their 
meetings.  Lord  Fingal  is  one  of  the  most  amiable  and  kind 
men  whom  it  has  been  my  good  fortune  to  have  been  ever  ac- 
quainted with.  Without  the  least  shadow  of  arrogance,  ana 
although  incapable  of  hurting  the  feelings  of  any  man,  he  still 
preserves  his  patrician  dignity  unimpaired,  and  commands  the 
respect  as  well  as  the  impartiality  of  every  one  who  approaches 
him.  Although  not  equal  to  his  son  in  intellectual  power,  he 
has  excellsnt  sense  and  admirable  discretion.  He  has  made 
few  cr  no  mistakes  in  public  life,  and  very  often,  by  his  cool- 
ness and  discretion,  has  prevented  the  adoption  of  rash  and 
injudicious  measures.  His  manners  are  disarming  ;  and  I  have 
understood,  upon  good  authority,  that  when  in  London,  where 
he  used  almost  annually  to  go,  as  head  of  the  Catholic  body, 
he  has  mitigated,  by  the  charm  of  his  converse,  the  hostility 
of  some  of  his  most  rancorous  political  opponents.  As  a  speaker, 
he  is  without  much  ability ;  but  there  is  a  gentleness  and  a 
grace  about  him  which  supply  the  place  of  eloquence,  and  ren- 
der his  audience  so  favorable  to  him,  that  he  has  often  suc- 
ceeded in  persuading,  where  others  of  greater  faculty  might, 
have  employed  the  resources  of  oratory  in  vain. 

An  individual,  who  is  now  dead,  about  this  time  made  a 
great  sensation,  not  only  in  the  Catholic  Association,  but 
through  the  empire.  This  was  the  once-famous  Doctor  Drum- 
goole,  whom  Lord  Kenyon  seems  determined  not  to  allow  to 
remain  in  peace.  He  was  the  grand  anti-vetoist,  and  was,  I 
believe,  a  most  sincere  and  unaffected  sentinel  of  religion.  He 
kept  watch  over  the  Catholic  hierarchy,  and  took  the  whole 
body  of  the  clergy  under  his  vigilant  protection.  It  was,  how- 
ever, a  speech  which  he  delivered  at  the  Shakspere  Gallery, 
in  Exchequer  street  [Dublin],  at  a  Catholic  meeting,  that  tended 
chiefly  to  give  him  notoriety.  He  assailed  the  tenets  of  the 
established  religion  with  a  good  deal  of  that  sort  of  candor 
which  Protestants  at  that  period  regarded  as  the  height  of  pro- 
sumption,  but  which  is  now  surpassed  every  day  by  the  ha- 
rangues of  the  orators  of  the  Catholic  Association.  The  Doc- 
tor's speech  may  be  considered  as  a  kind  of  epoch  in  Catholic 
politics ;  for  he  was  the  first  who  ventured  to  employ  against 


•  DOCTOR   PRUMGOOLE.  375 

the  opponents  of  Emancipation  the  weapons  which  are  habitu- 
ally used  against  the  professors  of  the  Roman  Catholic  religion. 
Men  who  swear  that  the  creed  of  the  great  majority  of  Chris- 
tians is  idolatrous  and  superstitious,  should  not  be  very  sensi- 
tive when  their  controversial  virulence  is  turned  upon  therm 

The  moment  Doctor  Drumgoole's  philippic  on  the  Reforma- 
tion appeared,  a  great  outcry  took  place,  and  Roman  Catholics 
were  not  wanting  to  modify  and  explain  away  the  Doctor's 
scholastic  vituperation.  He  himself,  however,  was  fixed  and 
s'ubborn  as  the  rock  on  which  he  believed  that  his  doctrines 
were  built.  No  kind  of  apology  could  be  extorted  from  him. 
He  was,  indeed,  a  man  of  a  peculiarly  stubborn  and  inflexible 
cast  of  mind.  It  must,  however,  be  admitted  that,  for  every 
position  which  he  advanced,  he  was  able  to  adduce  very  strong 
and  cogent  reasoning.  He  was  a  physician  by  profession,  but 
in  practice  and  in  predilection  he  was  a  theologian  of  the  most 
uncompromising  sort.  He  had  a  small  fortune,  which  rendered 
him  independent  of  patients,  and  he  addicted  himself,  strenu- 
ously and  exclusively,  to  the  study  of  the  scholastic  arts.  He 
was  beyond  doubt  a  very  well-informed  and  a  clever  man.  He 
had  a  great  command  of  speech,  and  yet  was  not  a  pleasing 
speaker.  He  was  slow,  monotonous,  and  invariable.  His 
countenance  was  full  of  medical  and  theological  solemnity, 
and  he  was  wont  to  carry  a  huge  stick  with  a  golden  head,  on 
which  he  used  to  press  both  his  hands  in  speaking;  and  in- 
deed, from  the  manner  in  which  he  swayed  his  body,  and 
knocked  his  stick  at  the  end  of  every  period  to  the  ground, 
which  he  accompanied  with  a  strange  and  guttural  "hem!" 
he  seemed  to  me  a  kind  of  rhetorical  pavior,  wrho  was  busily 
engaged  in  making  the  great  road  of  Liberty,  and  paving  the 
way  to  Emancipation. 

The  Doctor  was  in  private  life  a  very  good  and  gentle-na- 
tured  man.  You  could  not  stir  the  placidity  of  his  temper  un- 
less you  touched  upon  the  Veto ;  and  upon  that  point  he  was 
scarcely  master  of  himself.  I  remember  well,  years  after  all 
discussion  upon  the  subject  had  subsided,  when  I  was  in  Paris, 
on  a  visit  at  the  house  of  a  friend  of  the  Doctor's  and  my  own, 
he  suddenly  walked  in,  just  after  his  arrival  from  Rome.     I 


376  CATHOLIC    LEADERS. 

had  not  seen  him  for  a  considerable  time,  but  I  bad  scarcely 
asked  him  bow  be  was,  when  be  reverted  to  the  Veto.  A  de- 
bate (it  was  in  the  year  1819)  was  immediately  opened  on  the 
subject.  Some  Irish  gentlemen  dropped  casually  in  ;  they  all 
took  their  share,  in  the  argument.  The  eloquence  of  the  dif- 
ferent disputants  became  inflamed  :  the  windows  toward  the 
street  had  been  left  unhappily  open;  a  crowd  of  Frenchmen 
collected  outside,  and  the  other  inhabitants  of  the  house  gath- 
ered at  the  doors  to  hear  the  discussion.  It  was  only  after  th-3 
Doctor,  who  was  still  under  the  influence  of  Vetophobia,  ha! 
taken  his  leave,  that  I  perceived  the  absurdity  of  the  incident. 
A  volume  of  "  Gil  Bias"  was  on  the  table  where  we  happened 
to  have  been  assembled,  and  by  accident  I  lighted  on  the  pas- 
sage in  which  he  describes  the  Irish  disputants  at  Salamanca  : 
"  Je  rcncontrois  quelque  fois  dcs  figures  Hibernoiscs.  11  falloii 
nous  voir  disputer,"  &c.  We  are  a  strange  people,  and  deserve 
our  designation  at  the  foreign  universities,  where  it  was  prover- 
bially said  of  the  Irish  that  they  were  "  ratione  furcntcs." 

There  were  others  besides  the  persons  whom  I  have  de- 
scribed, who  at  this  juncture  took  a  part  in  the  Catholic  poli- 
tics, and  who  are  deserving  of  mention  ;  but  as  they  have 
recently  made  a  figure  even  more  conspicuous  than  at  the 
Catholic  Committee,  I  reserve  them  for  subsequent  delineation. 
The  only  other  person  whom  I  remember  as  worthy  of  much 
note,  and  who  has  retired  from  Catholic  assemblies,  was  Peter 
Bodkin  Hussey.  Peter  was  a  very  droll,  sarcastic,  and  amu- 
sing debater.  He  dealt  almost  exclusively  in  irony,  and  em- 
ployed a  good  deal  of  grotesque  imagery  in  his  action,  which, 
if  it  did  not  instruct,  served  at  least  the  purposes  of  entertain- 
ment, lie  had  a  very  rubicund  and  caustic  countenance,  that 
was  surmounted  with  a  profusion  of  red  hair  ;  and,  from  his 
manner  and  aspect,  he  was  not  unhappily  designated  as  "Red 
Precipitate."  I  don't  know  from  what  motive  he  has  retired 
from  political  life ;  but,  though  he  is  still  young,  he  has  not 
recently  appeared  at  any  Roman  Catholic  assembly. 

These  were  the  individuals  who,  besides  the  performers  who 
still  continue  on  the  boards,  chiefly  figured  at  the  Catholic 
Committee,  which,  in  the  year  1811,  was  made  the  object  of  a 


BROKEN   HOPES.  87? 

prosecution  by  Mr.  Saurin.  Mr.  Kirwan  and  Doctor  Sheridan 
were  indicted  upon  the  Irish  Convention  Act,  for  having  been 
elected  to  sit  in  the  Catholic  Parliament.  The  Government 
strained  every  nerve  to  procure  a  conviction.  Mr.  Saurin  com- 
menced his  speech  in  the  following  words  :  "  My  Lords  and 
gentlemen  of  the  jury,  I  can  not  but  congratulate  you  and  the 
public  that  the  day  of  justice  has  at  length  arrived  ;"  and  the 
then  Solicitor-General,  the  present  Chief-Justice  Bushe,  in 
speaking  of  the  Committee,  constituted  as  it  was,  coucluded  his 
oration  thus  :  "  Compare  such  a  constitution  with  the  estab 
lished  authorities  of  the  land,  all  controlled,  confined  to  their 
respective  spheres,  balancing  and  gravitating  to  each  other  — 
all  symmetry,  all  order,  all  harmony.  Behold,  on  the  other 
hand,  this  prodigy  in  the  political  hemisphere,  with  eccentric 
course  and  portentous  glare,  bound  by  no  attraction,  disdain- 
ing any  orbit,  disturbing  the  system,  and  affrighting  the  world. " 
Upon  the  first  trial,  the  Catholic  Committee  were  acquitted ; 
but  upon  the  second,  the  Attorney-General  [Saurin]  mended 
his  hand,  and  the  jury  having  been  packed,  the  comet  was 
put  out. 

The  Catholic  Committee,  as  a  representative  body  elected 
by  the  people,  and  consisting  of  a  certain  number  of  members 
delegated  from  each  town  and  county,  ceased  to  exist.  A 
great  blow  had  been  struck  at  the  cause,  and  a  considerable 
time  elapsed  before  Ireland  recovered  from  it.  The  Russian 
war  ensued,  and  Bonaparte  fell.  The  hopes  of  the  Catholics 
fell  with  the  peace.  A  long  interval  elapsed,  in  which  nothing 
very  important  or.  deserving  of  record  took  place.  A  political 
lethargy  spread  itself  over  the  great  body  of  the  people,  and 
the  assemblies  of  the  Catholics  became  more  unfrequent,  and 
their  language  more  despondent  and  hopeless  than  it  had  ever 
before  been.  The  unfortunate  differences  which  had  taken 
place  between  the  aristocracy  and  the  great  body  of  the  people 
respecting  the  Veto,  had  left  many  traces  of  discord  behind, 
and  divided  them  from  each  other;  they  no  longer  exhibited 
any  very  formidable  object  to  their  antagonists. 

Thus  matters  stood  till  the  year  1821,  when  the  King  inti- 
mated his  intention  to  visit  Ireland.     The  nation  awoke  at 


378  CATHOLIC   LEADHB&. 

this  intelligence ;  and  it  was  believed  by  the  Catholics,  and 
surmised  by  the  Protestants,  that  their  sovereign  could  scarcely 
mean  to  visit  this  portion  of  his  dominions  from  any  idle 
curiosity,  or  from  an  anxiety  to  play  the  principal  part  in  a 
melodramatic  procession  through  the  Irish  metropolis.  It  was 
reasonably  concluded  that  he  must  have  intended  to  come  as 
the  herald  of  national  tranquillity,  and  as  the  great  pacificator 
of  his  people.  Before  his  arrival,  the  two  parties  formed  a 
temporary  amnesty ;  and  Mr.  O'Connell,  who  had  gained  the 
first  eminence  in  his  profession,  and  had  become  the  undisputed 
leader  of  the  Catholic  body,  used  his  best  endeavors  to  effect 
a  reconciliation  between  the  Orangemen  of  the  Corporation 
and  the  Irish  Catholics. 

Sir  Benjamin  Blooinfield*  arrived  in  Dublin  before  his  mas- 
ter, and  intimated  the  Royal  anxieties  that  all  differences  and 
animosities  should  be  laid  aside.  Accordingly,  it  was  agreed 
that  a  public  dinner  should  be  held  at  Morrison's  tavern, 
where  the  leaders  of  both  factions  should  pledge  each  other  in 
libations  of  everlasting  amity.  This  national  festivity  took 
place ;  and  from  the  vehement  protestations  on  both  sides,  it 
was  believed  by  many  that  a  lasting  reconciliation  had  been 
effected.  Master  Ellis  and  Mr.  O'Connell  almost  embraced 
each  other.  The  King  arrived  ;  the  Catholics  determined  not 
to  intrude  their  grievances  upon  him.  Accordingly  our  gra- 
cious Sovereign  passed  rather  an  agreeable  time  in  Dublin. 
He  was  hailed  with  tumultuous  hurrasf  wherever  he  passed ; 

*  Sir  Benjamin  Bloomfiekl,  bom  in  1762,  was  an  Irish  artillery  officer  when 
he  attracted  the  notice  of  the  Prince  of  Wales,  who  made  him  a  member  of  his 
household  in  1808,  knighted  him  in  1815,  and  in  1817,  on  the  resignation  of 
Sir  John  MacMahon,  appointed  him  Receiver-General  of  the  Duchy  of  Cornwall, 
private  Secretary,  and  Keeper  of  the  privy  purse.  All  these  were  lucrative 
offices,  and  Bloomfiekl  "  feathered  his  nest"  very  well.  In  1824,  his  Royal 
Master,  then  George  IV.  quarrelled  with  him  about  a  lady  (the  late  fat  and  fair 
Marchioness  of  Conyngham),  and  Sir  Benjamin  was  sent,  in  a  sort  of  honorable 
exile,  as  Ambassador  to  Sweden.  In  May,  1825,  he  was  created  Lord  Bloom- 
field,  and  he  died  in  August,  1846.  The  secret  history  of  this  court  favorite's 
rise  and  fall  is  full  of  interest,  but  too  long  to  be  related  here. —  M. 

t  No  doubt,  a  great  dcul  may  be  done,  in  the  way  of  concession,  to  obtain 
"  peace  and  quietness."     This  is  said  to  be  the  principle  on  which  so  much 


ORIGIN    OF   THE    CATHOLIC    ASSOCIATION.  3?0 

and  in  return  for  the  enthusiastic  reception  which  lie  had  found, 
he  directed  Lord  Sidmouth  to  write  a  letter,  recommending  it 
to  the  people  to  be  united.  His  Majesty  shortly  afterward 
set  sail,  with  tears  in  his  eyes,  from  Kingstown.  For  a  little 
while  the  Catholics  continued  under  the  miserable  deception 
under  which  they  had  labored  during  the  Royal  sojourn,  but 
when  they  found  that  no  intention  existed  to  introduce  a 
change  of  system  into  Ireland  —  that  the  King's  visit  seemed 
an  artifice,  and  Lord  Sidmouth's  epistle  meant  nothing  —  and 
that  while  men  were  changed,  measures  continued  substantially 
unaltered,  they  began  to  perceive  that  some  course  more  effect- 
ual than  a  loyal  solicitude  not  to  disturb  the  repose  of  Majesty, 
should  be  adopted. 

The  present  Catholic  Association  rose  out  of  the  disappoint- 
ment of  the  people.  Its  foundations  were  laid  by  Sir.  O'Con- 
nell,  in  conjunction  with  Mr.  Sheil.  They  both  happened  to 
meet  at  the  house  of  a  common  friend  in  the  mountains  of 
Wicklow,  and  after  exchanging  their  opinions  on  the  deplor- 
able state  to  which  the  Catholic  mind  had  been  reduced,  and 
the  utter  want  of  system  and  organization  in  the  body,  it  was 
agreed  by  those  gentlemen  that  they  should  both  sign  an 
address  to  the  Irish  Catholics,  and  enclose  it  to  the  principal 
members  of  the  body.  This  proceeding  was  considered  pre- 
sumptuous by  many  of  the  individuals  to  whom  their  mauifesto 
was  directed  ;  and  under  other  circumstances,  perhaps,  it  might 
be  regarded  as  an  instance  of  extreme  self-reliance ;  but  it 
was  absolutely  necessary  that  some  endeavor  should  be  made 
to  rouse  the  national  mind  from  the  torpor  into  which  it  had 
fallen. 

A  very  thin  meeting,  which  did  not  consist  of  more  than 

c o-.vcr  is  permitted  to  the  fair  sex. —  O'Connell  yielded  a  great  deal  when 
Geoige  the  Fourth  came  to  Ireland,  in  1821,  whereof  Byron  wrote, 
"  The  Messiah  of  royalty  comes, 
Like  a  goodly  Leviathan  rolled  from  the  waves." 
O'Connell  presented  an   immense   shamrock   to  George  IV.,  and   even   drank 
"The  pious,  glorious,  and  immortal  memory  of  William  III.,"   with    Dublin 
Corporation  —  tlie  offensive  part  of  the  toast  was  no  doubt  omitted.      But  as  soon 
as  the  King  left  the  island,  the  old  political  feuds  revived  —  the  stronger  for 
the  interregnum. —  M. 


380  CATHOLIC   LfcADfittS. 

about  twenty  individuals,  was  held  at  a  tavern  set  up  by  a 
man  of  the  name  of  Dempsey,  in  Sackville  street;  and  it  was 
there  determined  that  something  should  be  done.  The  founda- 
tions of  the  Association  were  then  laid,  and  it  must  be  owned 
that  its  first  meetings  afforded  few  indications  of  the  import- 
ance and  the  magnitude  to  which  it  was  destined  to  be  raised. 
The  attendance  was  so  thin,  and  the  public  appeared  so  insen- 
sible to  the  proceedings  which  took  place  in  those  small  con- 
vocations, that  it  is  almost  surprising  that  the  enterprise  was 
not  relinquished  in  despair.  The  Association  in  its  origin  was 
treated  with  contempt,  not  only  by  its  open  adversaries,  but 
Catholics  themselves  spoke  of  it  with  derision,  and  spurned  at 
the  walls  of  mud, 'which  their  brethren  had  rapidly  thrown  up, 
and  which  were  afterward  to  become  alta  mania  Roma.  At 
length,  however,  the  men  who  had  formerly  been  active  in 
Catholic  affairs  were  got  together,  and  the  great  body  of  the 
people  were  awakened  from  their  insensibility.  The  powerful 
appeals  of  Daniel  O'Connell,  who  now  began  to  develop  even 
greater  abilities  than  he  had  before  exhibited,  and  whose 
ambition  was  excited  by  the  progress  which  he  had  made  in 
his  profession,  stirred  the  mind  of  Ireland. 

The  aristocracy,  who  had  been  previously  alienated,  had 
forgotten  many  affronts  which  had  been  put  upon  them,  and 
began  to  reunite  themselves  with  the  people.  Lord  Killeen, 
the  son  of  the  Earl  of  Fingal,  came  forward  as  the  representa- 
tive of  his  father  and  of  the  Catholic  nobility.  He  was  free 
from  the  habits  of  submission  which  the  Catholic  aristocracy 
had  contracted  at  the  period  of  their  extreme  depression,  and 
was  animated  by  an  ardent  consciousness  of  the  rights  which 
were  withheld  from  him.  This  young  nobleman  threw  him- 
self into  a  zealous  co-operation  with  Mr.  O'Connell,  and  by  his 
abilities  aided  the  impression  which  his  rank  and  station  were 
calculated  to  produce.  His  example  was  followed  by  other 
noblemen ;  and  Lord  Gormanstown,  a  Catholic  peer  of  great 
fortune,  and  of  very  ancient  descent,  although  hitherto  unused 
to  public  life,  appeared  at  the  Catholic  Association.  This 
good  man  had  labored  for  many  years  under  the  impression 
that  the  Catholics  were  frustrating  their  own  objects  by  the 


DOCTOR   DOYLE.  381 

violence  with  which  they  were  pursued,  and  had,  in  conse- 
quence, absented  himself  from  their  assemblies;  but  at  length 
the  delusion  passed  away.  His  example  was  followed  by  the 
Earl  of  Kenmare,  who,  though  he  did  not  actually  attend  the 
Association  (for  he  abhors  popular  exhibition),  sent  in  the 
authority  of  his  name,  and  his  pecuniary  contribution. 

Thus  the  aristocracy  was  consolidated  with  the  Catholic 
democracy,  and  Mr.  O'Oonnell  began  to  wield  them  both  with 
the  power  of  which  new  manifestations  were  every  day  given. 
In  a  little  time  a  general  movement  was  produced  through  the 
country  ;  the  national  attention  was  fixed  upon  the  delibera- 
tions of  the  body  which  had  thus  started  up  from  the  ruins  of 
the  old  Catholic  Committee ;  its  meetings  became  crowded  to 
excess.  The  newspapers  teamed  with  vehement  harangues; 
and  the  public  mind,  heated  and  excited  by  these  impassioned 
and  constantly-repeated  appeals,*  began  to  exhibit  an  entirely 
different  character. 

The  junction  of  the  aristocracy  and  of  the  democracy  was 
a  most  important  achievement.  But  this  confederacy  was 
greatly  strengthened  by  the  alliance  of  another  and  still  more 
powerful  body,  the  Catholic  priesthood  of  Ireland.  The  sym- 
pathy which  the  clergy  have  manifested  in  the  efforts  of  the 
Association,  and  the  political  part  which  they  have  lately 
played,  are  to  be  referred,  in  a  great  measure,  to  the  influence 
of  a  very  greatly  gifted  man.  Doctor  Doyle,  the  Catholic 
Bishop  of  Kildare  and  Leighlin,  is  certainly  among  the  most 
remarkable  men  who  have  appeared  in  this  strange  state  of 
things,  and  has  most  essentially  contributed  to  the  moral  and 

*  O'Connell's  voice  was  deep,  sonorous,  and  manageable.  Its  transitions 
from  the  higher  to  the  lower  notes  were  wondrously  effective.  He  rather  af- 
fected a  full  Irish  pronunciation,  on  which  was  slightly  grafted  something  of 
the  accent  which,  in  his  youth,  he  had  involuntarily  picked  up  in  France.  No 
man  had  a  clearer  pronunciation  —  at  times,  it  even  went  to  the  extent  of  almost 
syllabicizing  long  words.  He  could  speak  for  a  longer  time  than  most,  men, 
without  pausing  to  take  breath.  When  making  a  speech,  his  mouth  was  very 
expressive.  In  his  eyes  (of  a  cold,  clear  blue),  there  was  little  speculation, 
but  the  true  Irish  expression  of  feeling,  passion,  and  intellect,  played  about  hi.« 
lips.  Looking  at  him,  as  he  spoke,  an  observer  might  note  the  sentiment  about 
to  issue  from  those  lips,  before  the  words  had  utterance — just  as  we  see  thfl 
li^blning-flash  before  we  hear  the  thunder-peal, —  jVff 


382  CATHOLIC   LEADERS. 

political  feeling  which  has  grown  up  among  the  people.*  He 
was  educated  at  a  university  in  Portugal,  where  it  was  not 
very  likely  that  he  would  contract  any  very  ardent  attachment 
to  freedom,  but  his  original  love  of  his  country  overcame  the 
theology  of  Coimbra,  and  he  returned  to  Ireland  with  a  mind 
deeply  imbued  with  learning,  fraught  with  eloquence,  and 
burning  with  patriotism. 

He  was  for  some  time  a  professor  in  the  Ecclesiastical 
College  at  Oarlow,  and,  before  he  was  made  a  bishop,  was 
unknown  as  a  politician.     But  the  crosier  had  been  scarcely 

*  The  Reverend  James  Doyle,  D.  D.,  was  an  Irishman,  who,  being  intended 
for  the  Catholic  priesthood,  received  his  education  at  Coimbra,  in  Portugal, 
whence  he  removed  on  being-  appointed  Professor  of  Theology  to  the  College 
of  Carlow.  In  1819,  and  before  he  was  forty  years  old,  he  was  made  Catholic 
Bisbop  of  Kildare  and  Leighlin — being  the  youngest  man  ever  raised  to  the 
prelacy  in  Ireland.  His  erudition  was  great  and  his  controversial  skill  soon 
became  eminent.  In  1823,  Dr.  Magee,  Protestant  Ai-chbishop  of  Dublin,  pub- 
lished a  charge  to  his  clergy,  in  wbich  he  warned  them  of  the  assaults  on  Prot- 
estantism from  Catholics  and  Dissenters  —  or,  as  he  chose  to  express  it,  from 
"a  church  without  religion,  and  a  religion  without  a  church."  This  antithesis 
provoked  Dr.  Doyle,  who  replied  to  Dr.  Magee  in  a  cutting  and  learned  work, 
showing  that  the  Protestant  Church  was  itself  a  usurpation,  that  its  Bishops 
were  usurpers,  and  that  the  Apostolical  Succession  could  not  properly  be  traced 
by  or  for  them  through  the  Catholic  Church.  Dr.  Doyle  signed  this  "  J.  K.  L." 
the  initials  of  his  prelatic  signature,  "  James  Kildare  and  Leighlin,"  and 
his  future  publications,  which  were  numerous,  bore  the  same  distinguishing 
letters. —  He  was  much  in  favor  of  Toor  Laws  for  Ireland,  and  succeeded  in  con- 
verting Mr.  O'Connell  to  his  opinion.  When  that  gentleman  returned  to  his 
original  opposition  to  Poor  Laws,  Dr.  Doyle  publicly  declared  that  a  man  so 
unstable  in  opinion  was  unsuited  for  a  great  popular  leader.  It  was  in  noticing 
this  that  O'Connell  declared  that  "  Consistency  was  a  rascally  doctrine."  Dr. 
Doyle  was  a  firm  believer  in  the  miracles  said  to  have  been  wrought  by  or 
through  the  instrumentality  of  Prince  Hohenloe. —  Dr.  Doyle's  evidence,  before 
a  Committee  of  the  House  of  Lords,  in  1825,  on  the  state  of  Ireland,  attracted 
great  attention  then,  and  for  years  after,  and  tended  much  to  extend  his  repu- 
tation as  a  close  observer  and  philosophical  reasoner.  He  died,  June  15,  1834 
at  Braganza  House,  near  Carlow,  a  mansion  which  had  been  purchased  as  a 
residence  for  the  Catholic  Bishops  of  the  diocese.  He  had  furnished  this  at 
his  own  expense,  and  bequeathed  the  contents  of  this  house,  including  his 
library,  to  his  successor.  lie  had  succeeded  in  building,  in  Carlow,  one  of  the 
finest  Cathedrals  in  Ireland,  obtaining  the  necessary  funds  by  much  self-priva- 
tions, and  by  unwearied  solicitations  of  the  wealthy,  and  his  mortal  remains  »\ere 
Interred  within  the  walls  of  this  beautiful  and  hallowed  fane. —  M. 


DOCTORS    OF    SOKBONNB.  38? 

placed  in  his  Lands  when  he  raised  it  in  the  cause  of  his  coun- 
try, He  wrote,  and  his  writings  were  so  st.vikingly  eloquent 
in  diction  and  powerful  in  reasoning,  that  they  at  once  invited 
the  attention  of  the  public.  He  fearlessly  broached  doctrines 
which  not  only  startled  the  Government,  but  gave  alarm  to 
some  of  the  hoary  professors  at  Maynooth.  In  the  following 
passage  in  his  letter  to  Mr.  Robertson,  after  speaking  of  the 
likelihood  of  a  rebellion  and  a  French  invasion,  he  says : 
"  The  Minister  of  England  can  not  look  to  the  exertions  of 
the  Catholic  priesthood  :  they  have  been  ill-treated,  and  they 
may  yield  for  a  moment  to  the  influence  of  nature,  though  it 
be  opposed  to  grace.  This  clergy,  with  a  few  exceptions,  are 
from  the  ranks  of  the  people  ;  they  inherit  their  feelings  ;  they 
are  not,  as  formerly,  brought  up  under  despotic  governments ; 
and  they  have  imbibed  the  doctrines  of  Locke  and-  Paley, 
more  deeply  than  those  of  Bellarmin,  or  even  of  Bossuet,  on 
the  divine  right  of  kings.  They  know  much  more  of  the  prin- 
ciples of  the  constitution  than  they  do  of  passive  obedience. 
If  a  rebellion  were  raging  from  Oarrickfergus  to  Cape  Clear, 
no  sentence  of  excommunication  would  ever  be  fulminated  by 
a  Catholic  prelate." 

This  announcement  of  what  is  now  obviously  the  truth  cre- 
ated a  sort  of  consternation.  Lord  Wellesley,  it  is  said,  in 
order  to  neutralize  the  effects  of  this  fierce  episcopal  warning, 
appealed  to  Maynooth ;  and  from  Maynooth  there  issued  a 
document  in  which  it  is  well  understood  that  the  students  and 
even  the  President,  Dr.  Crotty,  did  not  agree,  but  to  which 
names  of  five  of  the  theological  professors  were  attached. 
The  persons  who  were  mainly  instrumental  in  getting  up  a 
declaration  in  favor  of  passive  obedience  (which  is,  however, 
more  mitigated  than  the  famous  proclamation  of  servility 
which  issued  from  the  University  of  Oxford)  were  two  old 
French  doctors  of  Sorbonne,  who  had  found  bread  in  the 
Irish  College,  Monsieur  de  la  Hogue  and  Monsieur  Francois 
d'Anglade.  These  individuals  belonged,  when  in  their  own 
country,  to  the  "  ancien  regime  ;"  and,  with  a  good  deal  of 
learning,  imported  into  Ireland  a  very  strong  relish  for  submis 
sion      The  following  was  their  protest  against  Dr.  Doyle  ; — ■ 


384  CATHOLIC   LEADEIIS. 

"Royal  Catholic  College  of  St.  Patrick,  Maynooth. —  In  con- 
sequence of  recent  public  allusions  to  the  domestic  education 
of  the  Catholic  Clergy,  we  the  undersigned,  Professors  of  the 
Roman  Catholic  College  of  Maynooth,  deem  it  a  duty  which 
we  owe  to  Religion  and  to  the  country,  solemnly  and  publicly 
to  state,  that,  in  our  respective  situations,  we  have  uniformly 
inculcated  allegiance  to  our  gracious  Sovereign,  respect  for  the 
constituted  authorities,  and  obedience  to  the  Laws. 

"  In  discharging  this  solemn  duty,  we  have  been  guided  by 
the  unchangeable  principles  of  the  Catholic  Religion,  plainly 
and  forcibly  contained  in  the  following  precepts  of  St.  Peter 
and  St.  Paul : 

" '  Be  ye  subject,  therefore,  to  every  human  creature  for 
God's  sake ;  whether  it  be  to  the  King,  as  excelling,  or  to 
governors  sent  by  him,  for  the  punishment  of  evil-doers,  and 
for  the  praise  of  the  good  :  for  so  is  the  will  of  God,  that  by 
doing  well  you  may  put  to  silence  the  ignorance  of  foolish 
men,  as  free  and  not  as  making  liberty  a  cloak  for  malice,  but 
as  the  servants  of  God.  Honor  all  men.  Love  the  brother- 
hood. Fear  God.  Honor  the  King For  this  is  thanks- 
worthy,  if  for  conscience  toward  God  a  man  endures  sorrows, 
suffering  wrongfully.  For  what  glory  is  it,  if  committing  sin, 
and  being  suffering  for  it,  you  endure?  But  if  doing  well  you 
suffer  patiently,  this  is  thanks-worthy  before  God.'  1st  Ep. 
of  St.  Peter,  c.  ii. 

"  '  Let  every  soul  be  subject  to  higher  powers  :  for  there  is 
no  power  but  from  God  ;  and  those  that  are,  are  ordained  of 
God.  Therefore,  he  that  resisteth  the  power,  resisteth  the 
ordinance  of  God.  And  they  that  resist,  purchase  to  them- 
selves damnation.  For  Princes  are  not  a  terror  to  the  good 
work,  but  to  the  evil.  "Wilt  thou,  then,  not  be  afraid  of  the 
Power?     Do  that  which  is  good,  and  thou  shalt  have  praise  for 

the  same. Wherefore  be  subject  of  necessity,  not  only  for 

wrath,  but  also  for  conscience  sake.'  Ep.  to  the  Rom.  c.  xiii. 

"  Our  commentaries  on  these  texts  can  not  be  better  con- 
veyed than  in  the  language  of  Tertullian  :  '  Christians  are 
aware  who  has  conferred  their  power  on  the  Emperors  :  they 
know  it  is  God,  after  whom  tbev  are  first  in  rank,  and  second  tP 


"j.  k,  u"  385 

no  other.  From  the  sa  lie  Source  which  imparts  life  they  also 
derive  their  power.  We  Christians  invoke  on  all  the  Emperors 
tl>e  blessings  of  long  life,  a  prosperous  reign,  domestic  security, 
a  brave  army,  a  devoted  senate,  and  a  moral  people.'  — 
Apology,  chap.  30. 

"  Into  the  sincerity  of  these  professions  we  challenge  the 
most  rigid  inquiry;  and  we  appeal  with  confidence  to  the 
peaceable  and  loyal  conduct  of  the  Clergy  educated  in  this 
Establishment,  and  to  their  exertions  to  preserve  the  public 
order,  as  evidence  of  the  soundness  of  the  principles  inculcated 
in  this  College.  These  principles  are  the  same  which  have 
been  ever  taught  by  the  Catholic  Church ;  and  if  any  change 
has  been  wrought  in  the  minds  of  the  Clergy  of  Ireland,  it  is, 
that  religious  obligation  is  here  strengthened  by  motives  of 
gratitude,  and  confirmed  by  sworn  allegiance,  from  which  no 
power  on  earth  can  absolve." 

Such  Avas  the  Sorbonne  manifesto,  which,  notwithstanding 
the  awful  names  of  La  Hogue  and  d'Anglade,  was  laughed  at 
by  the  Irish  priesthood.  The  reputation  of  Doctor  Doyle  was 
more  widely  extended  by  this  effort  of  antiquated  divinity  to 
suppress  him  ;  and  the  Government  found  additional  proofs  in 
the  result  of  his  publication  of  the  unfortunate  truths  which  it 
contained. 

J.  K.  L.,  the  name  by  which  Dr.  Doyle  is  generally  known, 
and  which  is  composed  of  the  initials  of  his  titular  designation, 
threw  into  the  Catholic  Association  all  the  influence  of  his 
sacred  authority  ;  and,  having  openly  joined  that  body,  in- 
creased the  reverence  with  which  the  people  had  previously 
considered  its  proceedings,  and  imparted  to  it  something  of  a 
religious  character.  The  example  which  was  given  by  Doctor 
Doyle  was  followed  by  other  dignitaries  of  the  Church,  of 
whom  the  most  remarkable  are  Doctor  Murray,  the  Archbishop 
of  Dublin,  and  Doctor  Kelly,  the  Bishop  of  Waterford. 

Doctor  Murray  is  the  successor  of  the  late  Doctor  Troy.* 

*  The  Ri^ht  Reverend  Thomas  Troy,  D.  D.,  Roman  Catholic  Archbishop  of 
Dublin,  was  born  July  7,  1739,  and  died  May  11,  1823.  It  is  curioua  and  histor- 
ically instructive,  to  compare  this  prelate^  poverty  with  the  weaUIi  of  some  of 
the  Protestant  hierarchy.     The  personal  property  left  by  each  of  the  last  tnree 

Vol.  T. — 17 


386  CATHOLIC   LEADEK3. 

That  excellent  ecclesiastic  had  for  many  years  presided  ovei 
the  see  of  Dublin,  rather  with  the  prudence  and  caution  which 
had  been  acquired  in  times  of  political  oppression,  than  with 
the  energy  and  determination  which  became  the  augmenting 
power  of  the  Catholic  body.     He  had  acquired  his  habits  at 
an  epoch,  if  not  of  servility,  of  oppression,  and  had  been  ac- 
customed to  accomplish,  by  dexterous  acquiescence,  what  would 
now  be  insisted  upon  as  a  right.     During  the  Irish  rebellion 
he  is  said  to  have  shown  great  skill ;  and,  by  his  influence  at 
the  Castle,  prevented  the  Roman  Catholic  chapels  from  being 
closed  up.     H^  was  accounted  a  goud  divine,  but  had  neither 
the  faculty  of  composition  nor  of  speech.     He  had  received 
his  education  at  Rome,  and  was  a  member  of  the  order  of  St. 
.Dominic.     He  had  the  look,  too,  of  a  holy  bon-vivant,  for  he 
was  squat  and  corpulent,  had  a  considerable  abdominal  pleni- 
tude, and  a  ruddy  countenance,  with   a  strong  determination 
of  blood  to  the  nose..     Yet  his  aspect  belied  him,  for  he  was 
conspicuous  for  the  simplicity  and  abstemiousness  of  his  life ; 
and  although  Lord  Norbury,  observing  Mr.  iEneas  M'Donuel 
descending  the  steps  of  his  house,  exclaimed,  "  There  is  pious 
iEneas   coming  from  the  sack  of  Troy,"  and  by  the  celebrity 
of  the  pun  extended  to  the  Doctor  a  renown  for  hospitality, 
the  latter  had  scarcely  the  mean's  of  supporting  himself  in  a 
manner  consistent  with  his  clerical  station.     He   died  in  ex- 
ceeding poverty,  for  one  guinea  only  was  found  in  his  posses- 
sion.    This  arose  partly  from  the  narrowness  of  his  income, 
and  partly  from  his  generous  disposition.     He  had  about  eight 
hundred  pounds  a-year,  and  expended  it  on  the  poor. 

This  good  man  was  succeeded  by  the  present  Archbishop  of 
Dublin,  Doctor  Murray.*     He  was  educated  in  the  University 

Archbishops  of  Armagh  was  over  two  hundred  thousand  pounds  sterling.  The 
income  of  the  Bishopric  of  Deny  which  is  now  only  four  thousand  five  hun- 
dred pounds  sterling  a  year!  was  formerly  twenty  thousand  —  more,  in  fact, 
than  that  of  the  Archbishopric  of  Tuam.  Therefore  when  the  Earl  of  Bristol, 
Bishop  of  Deny,  had  the  offer  of  the  arch-diocese  of  Tuam,  his  significant  repl> 
was  "  I  prefer  meuvi  to  luum."  As  a  general  rule,  the  Protestant  bishops  lea*/e 
much  wealth  behind  them,  and  the  Catholic  prelates  accumulate  nothing. —  M. 
*  The  late  Ai'chbishop  Murray  was  respected  by  all  classes  and  creeds  for 
his  liberality  of  opinion  and  his  practical  common  sense.     He  was  well  appre- 


ARCHBISHOPS    CURTIS    AND    MURRAY.  387 

of  Salamanca,  but  Ills  mind  is  untarnished  by  the  smoke  of  the 
scholastic  lamp,  and  he  has  a  spirit  of  liberty  within  him  whhh 
chows  how  compatible  the  ardent  citizen  is  with  the  enthusias- 
tic priest.  His  manners  are  not  at  all  Spanish,  although  he 
passed  many  years  in  Spain  under  the  tuition  of  Doctor  Curtis, 
the  Catholic  Primate,  who  wras  professor  of  theology  in  Sala- 
manca,! and  is  one  of  its  peculiar  "  Bachelors."  Doctor  Curtis 
is  almost  more  Spanish  than  the  Spanish  themselves,  for  he 
has  a  restlessness  of  gesture,  and  a  flexibility  of  the  physiog- 
nomical muscles,  which  surpass  the  vivacity  of  Andalusia,  and 
with  one  finger  laid  upon  his  nose,  with  his  eyes  starting  from 
his  head,  and  with  the  other  hand  quivering  like  that  of  a 
Chinese  juggler,  he  presents  the  most  singular  spectacle  of 
episcopal  vividness,  at  the  age  of  ninety-one,  which  I  have 
ever  seen. 

His  pupil  and  brother- Archbishop  of  Dublin  is  meek,  com- 
posed, and  placid,  and  has  an  expression  of  patience,  of  sweet- 
ness, and  benignity,  united  with  strong  intellectual  intimations, 
which  would  fix  the  attention  of  any  ordinary  observer  who 
chanced  to  see  him  in  the  public  way.  He  has  great  dignity 
and  simplicity  of  deportment,  and  has  a  bearing  befitting  his 
rank  without  the  least  touch  of  arrogance.  His  voice  is  singu- 
larly soft  and  harmonious ;    and  even  in  reproof  itself  he  does 

ciated  by  successive  Viceroys,  since  1829  —  even  the  nmst  intolerant  of  them 
respecting  a  man  who  wielded  immense  power,  but  avoided  all  misdirection  of 
it.     Like  his  predecessor,  Dr.  Troy,  he  died  poor. —  M. 

*  Dr.  Curtis,  Catholic  primate  of  Ireland,  bad  held  a  high  official  position 
in  Salamanca,  when  tbe  Duke  of  Wellington  was  battling  with  the  French,  in 
the  Peninsula,  and  had  rendered  such  essential  services  to  his  Grace,  that, 
after  the  war  was  over,  they  continued  to  correspond,  as  friends.  In  Decem- 
ber, 1828,  when  O'Connell's  election  for  Clare  had  brought  on  a  crisis,  he  wrote 
to  the  Duke,  pressing  Catholic  Emancipation  on  him,  as  a  necessity.  The 
Duke's  -ejily  was  dubious  —  lie  did  not  see  how  the  desiderated  measure  could 
then  be  granted,  and  he  recommended  that  the  question  "  be  buried  in  oblivion" 
for  a  time,  so  that  men  might  calmly  consider  it !  Dr.  Curtis  sent  this  lettei 
to  the  Marquis  of  Anglesea,  who  look  it  as  involving  a  sort  of  promise  to  do 
"justice  to  Ireland"  an  1  wrote  a  reply,  accordingly,  urging  that  the  question 
be  agitated,  and  not  buried  in  oblivion.  For  *his  expression  of  his  opinions 
lie  was  recalled  —  but,  in  less  than  two  months,  Wellington  came  before  the 
country,  with  a  proposal,  on  the  part  of  the  Government,  to  grant  the  Catholic 
claims. —  M. 


388  CATHOLIC    LEADERS. 

not  put  Lis  Christian  gentleness  aside.  His  preaching  is  of 
the  iirst  order.  It  is  difficult  to  hear  his  sermons  upon  charity 
without  tears;  and  there  is,  independently  of  the  charms  of 
diction  and  the  graces  of  elocution,  of  which  he  is  a  master,  an 
internal  evidence  of  his  own  profound  conviction  of  what  he 
utters,  that  makes  its  way  to  the  heart.  When  he  stands  in 
the  pulpit,  it  is  no  exaggeration  to  say  that  he  diffuses  a  kind 
of  piety  about  him  ;  he  seems  to  belong  to  the  holy  edifice, 
and  it  may  be  said  of  him  with  perfect  truth  — 

"  At  church,  with  me».ik  and  unaffected  grace, 
His  looks  adorned  the  venerable  place." 

It  is  obvious  that  such  a  man,  attended  by  all  the  influence 
which  his  office,  his  abilities,  f*nd  his  apostolic  life,  confer  upon 
him,  must  have  added  gre^t  veiglit  to  the  proceedings  of  the 
Association,  when,  with  a  zeal  in  patriotism  corresponding  with 
his  ardor  in  religion,  he  caused  himself  to  be  enrolled  among 
its  members.  "  The  contemplation  of  the  Avrongs  of  my 'coun- 
try" (he  exclaimed,  at  a  public  meeting  held  in  the  beautiful 
and  magnificent  Catholic  Cathedral  in  Marlborough  street,  Dub- 
lin)—  "the  contemplation  of  the  wrongs  of  my  country  makes 
my  soul  burn  within  me  !"  As  he  spoke  thus,  he  pressed  to  his 
heart  the  hand  which  the  people  were  accustomed  to  see  ex- 
alted from  the  altar  in  raising  the  Host  to  heaven.  His  fine 
countenance  was  inflamed  with  emotion,  and  his  whole  frame 
trembled  under  the  dominion  of  the  vehement  feeling  by  which 
he  was  excited. 

These  are  the  men  whom  our  Government,  in  its  wisdom, 
have  placed  in  alienation  from  the  state,  and  whose  character 
has  been  sketched  in  the  passage  which  I  have  quoted  from 
the  works  of  Doctor  Doyle.  The  other  eminent  ecclesiastic 
who  contributed  greatly  to  augment  the  power  of  the  Associa- 
tion, was  Doctor  Kelly,  the  terror  of  the  Beresfords,  and  the 
author  of  Mr.  Villiers  Stuart.  This  able  man,  the  Becket  of 
Ireland,  was  imported  to  us  from  America. 

END    OF    VOL.    I. 


CONTENTS   OF  YOL.  II. 


LORD  NORBURY. 

His  Rise  and  Progress. —  Fighting  One's  Way  to  Fortune. —  Sir  Boyle 
Roche's  Bulls. —  Robert  Emmett's  Trial. —  Norbuiy's  Judicial  Brutality. 
—  His  Personal  Appearance. —  Scenes  in  his  Court. —  A  Noble  Jester. — 
His  Intolerant  Politics. —  The  Saurin  Letter. —  His  Enforced  Resigna- 
tion    pack       5 

CLONMEL  ASSIZES. 
Murder  of  Mr.  Chadwick. —  Trial  and  Execution  of  Patrick  Grace. — The 
Approver  and  Vengeance. —  Murder  of  Daniel  Mara. —  Trial  of  the  As- 
sassins.—  Earl    of    Kingston. —  The    Melodrama    of    Crime Capital 

Conviction. —  Causes  of  Lrish  Disaffection 41 

THE  CATHOLIC  BAR. 

Exclusion  of  Catholics. —  Sir  Theobald  Butler's  Pleading  against  the 
Penal  Laws. —  The  Gallant  Sarsfield. —  British  Violation  of  the  Treaty  ot 
Limerick. —  Lord  Chesterfield  and  Lady  Palmer. —  Mr.  William  Bellew. 
— Catholic  Marriages. —  Money. —  The  Court  of  Chancery. —  A  Cath- 
olic Lawyer's  Religious  Manifestations 75 

SIR  MICHAEL  O'LOGHLIN. 
His  Person,  Deportment,  and  Descent. —  Bar  Costume. —  Bumbo  Green, 
the  Legal  Falstaff. —  British  Judicial  System. — Chief-Baron  O'Grady. — 
SirW.  C.  Smith. —  O'Loghlin  appointed  Master  of  the  Rolls.— r- Is  made 
a  Baronet. —  His  Danish  Ancestor 106 

LORD-CHANCELLOR  BLACKBURNE. 
Chief  Baron  Wolfe. —  Peter  Henchey  and  Lord  Manners. — Peter  Bur- 
rowes. — Ill-timed  Ascendency  Manifestation. —  Curran's  Eloquence  and 
Conversation. —  Blackburne's  Practice  and  Promotions. —  Orange  Char- 
ter Toast. — The  Burning  of  the  Sheas. —  Sheil's  Speech  to  the  Peasant- 
ry    118 

CONFESSIONS  OF  A  JUNIOR  BARRISTER. 
Training  for  the   Bar. —  Gale  Jones. —  Early   Struggles. —  An  Aggregate 
Meeting. —  Results  of  an  Oration. —  The  Lawyer  in  Love. —  A  Double 
Confidant. —  Eloquence  de  Billet. —  The  Gain  of  Godliness. —  Hope  de- 
ferred.—  Dancing  into  Practice 151 


4:  CONTENTS. 

LORD-CHANCELLOR  MANNERS. 
His  Biography. —  Farewell  to  the  L'ish   Bar. —  Mr.  Joy's  Valediction. — 
Catholic  Magistrates. —  Dublin  Corporation page   172 

THE  MANNERS  TESTIMONIAL. 
Scenes  in  the  Chancellor's  Career. — The  Jesuits. —  Judicial  Incompetency. 
—  Lord  Rathdown  in  Character 184 

THE  CATHOLIC  DEPUTATION. 

Catholic  Politics  in  1825. — Invasion  of  England. —  O'Connell  en  route. — 
Dr.  Milner  and  Charles  Butler. —  Burdett,  Plunket,  Brougham,  Weth- 
erell,  Peel,  and  Joseph  Hume,  the  Dukes  of  Devonshire  and  Leinster, 
Lox'ds  Durham  and  Abinger,  Dukes  of  Sussex  and  Norfolk,  Coke  of  Nor- 
folk.—  Character  of  O'Connell's  Eloquence. —  Catholic  Meeting  in  Lon- 
don.—  A  Dinner  Batch  of  Nobles. —  Charles  James  Fox  and  Lord  Grey.   192 

ARCHIBALD  HAMILTON  ROWAN. 
An  Irish  Patriot. —  Remarkable  Exteriox\ —  Flight  from  Prison. —  Jackson's 
Chivalry. —  Asylum  in  America 230 

JOHN  LESLIE  FOSTER. 

Louth  Election  in  1826. —  The  Roden  and  Oriel  League. —  Harry  Mills, 
the  "Village  Hampden." — Cost  of  making  a  Peer. —  Leslie  Foster  in 
Parliament. —  Nobility  among  the  Commons. —  Marquis  of  Anglesey. — 
Bot  Smith. —  The  Customs'  Job. —  Foster  in  Ermine 235 

THE  CLARE  ELECTION,  IN  1828. 
Vesey  Fitzgerald  opposed  by  the  Catholic  Association. —  Candidate-Hunt- 
ing.—  O'Connell  in  the  Field. —  Tom  Steele,  O'Gorman  Mahon,  and 
"Honest  Jack  Lawless." — Father  Tom  Maguire. —  The  Priest  of  Cor- 
ofin. —  The  Contest. —  O'Connell's  Victory,  and  its  Results. —  Sheil's 
Speech. —  "  The  Duke"  and  Catholic  Emancipation 265 

PENENDEN  HEATH  MEETING. 

Gathering  of  the  "Men  of  Kent." — Cobbett  and  Hunt. —  The  Brunswick- 
ers. —  Lord  Camden,  a  Model  Sinecurist. —  Sheil's  Unspoken  Speech  . .   315 

LORD  CHANCELLOR  BROUGHAM,  IN  1831. 
His  Elevation. —  Lord  Lyndhurst. —  The  Chancellor's  Levee. —  Archbishops 
of  Canterbury  and  York. —  Wellington  and  Brougham. —  Francis  Jef- 
frey.—  Scarlett. —  Jocky  Bell. —  The  Speaker. —  Lord  Denman 340 

STATE  OF  PARTIES  IN  DUBLIN. 

Recent  Changes. —  Mr.  Bellew  "in  Silk  Attire." — O'Loghlin. —  Purcel 
O'Gorman. —  Dublin  Election. —  The  Candidates:  Moore  and  Recorder 
Shaw,  Harty  and  Louis  Perrin. —  Sir  Anthony  Hart  and  the  Master  of 
the  Rolls. —  Mr.  Saurin. —  Dutch  Smugglers. —  Popular  Triumph 354 

Index 367 


SKETCHES  OF  THE  IRISH  BAR, 


LORD   NORBURY. 


Three  remarkable  incidents  have  lately  taken  place.  Lord 
Norbury,  in  testimony  of  his  long  and  numerous  services,  has 
been  created  an  earl,  Lord  Plunket  has  sunk  into  his  successor, 
and  Lord  Manners  took  his  leave  amidst  a  strong  odor  of 
onions,  and  the  tears  of  the  Irish  Bar.*  I  had  intended  to 
make  these  three  events  the  groundwork  of  the  present  article; 
for  Lord  Plunket's  first  appearance  on  the  stage  from  which 
Lord  Norbury  had  just  made  his  exit — his  wan  and  dejected 
aspect,  which  was,  as  much  as  his  intellect,  in  contrast  with  that 
of  his  predecessor — the  melancholy  smile  which  superseded, 
his  habitually  haughty  and  sardonic  expression  —  the  exulta- 
tion of  his  antagonists  at  seeing  him  descend  from  his  recent 
elevation,  and  the  sympathy  which  the  liberal  portion  of  the 
Bar  felt  in  what  was  considered  as  his  fall,  presented  a  scene 
of  deep  and  extraordinary  interest. 

It  was  also  my  purpose  (inasmuch  as  no  reasonable  expecta- 
tion can  be  entertained  that  a  new  edition  of  Rose  and  Beattie 
will  afford  an  opportunity  of  attaching,  by  way  of  appendix 

*  This  Sketch  was  published  in  November,  1827,  but  appears  to  have  been 
written  before  Canning's  death,  which  took  place  in  August,  during  the  same 
year.  The  retirement  of  Lord  Manners  from  the  Chancellorship,  and  the  ap- 
pointment of  Plunket  as  Chief-Justice  of  the  Common  Pleas,  took  place,  under 
Canning's  Administration,  in  1827. —  M 


6  LORD   NORBUR1T. 

to  those  immortal  records  of  judicial  wisdom,  a  report  of  Lord 
Manners's  last  judgment  upon  himself)  to  preserve  some  account 
of  his  lordship's  final  adjudication  upon  his  own  merits,  and  to 
commemorate  the  tear  that  fell  upon  that  pathetic  occasion 
from  the  "  Outalissi"  of  the  Four  Courts — 

"  The  first,  the  last,  the  only  tear 
That  Peter  Henchey  shed :" 

but  I  find  that  the  first  of  the  incidents  to  which  I  have  re- 
ferred, together  with  an  account  of  the  progress  of  Lord  Nor- 
bury  through  the  various  parts  which  he  performed  in  the 
political  theatre,  from  his  first  entrance  as  "  an  Irish  gentle- 
man" in  the  House  of  Commons,' to  his  exit  as  a  jester  from 
the  bench,  will  occupy  so  much  space,  that  I  must  confine 
myself  to  the  biography  of  his  Lordship  ;  which,  however  little 
it  may  be  instructive,  will  not,  I  think,  be  found  unamusing, 
and  falls  within  the  scope  of  the  articles  on  the  Irish  Bar. 

In  the  account  given  by  Sir  Pertinax  Macsycophant  of  his 
rise  and  progress  in  the  world,  he  states  that  his  only  patri- 
mony was  a  piece  of  parental  advice,  which  stood  him  in  lieu 
of  an  estate.  I  have  heard  it  said,  that  Lord  Norbury,  in 
detailing  the  circumstances  which  attended  his  original  ad- 
vancement in  life,  generally  commenced  the  narrative  of  his 
adventures  with  a  death-bed  scene  of  a  peculiarly  Irish  char- 
acter. His  father,  a  gentleman  of  a  respectable  Protestant 
family  in  the  county  of  Tipperary,  called  him  in  his  last 
moments  to  his  side,  and  after  stating  that,  in  order  to  sustain 
the  ancient  and  venerable  name  of  Toler  in  its  dignity,  he 
had  devised  the  estate  derived  from  a  sergeant  (not  at  law)  to 
his  eldest  son,  the  old  Cromwellian  drew  from  under  his  pillow 
a  case  of  silver-mounted  pistols,  and,  delivering  this  "  donatio 
mortis  causa,"  charged  him  never  to  omit  exhibiting  the 
promptitude  of  an  Irish  gentleman,  in  resorting  to  these  foren- 
sic and  parliamentary  instruments  of  advancement* 

*  Lord  Norbury  made  frequent,  if  not  good,  use  of  his  pistols  —  "barkers," 
as  they  were  called  in  fighting  parlance.  He  fought  with  several  persons,  one 
of  whom  was  the  ruffianly  "  Fighting  Fitzgerald"  who  was  finally  hanged  foi 
murder.  In  those  days  a  duel  was  necessary  to  fix  a  man's  character.  When 
a  young  man  entered  society,  the  first  word  wat,  "  What  family  does  he  come 


CALLED   TO   THE   BAtt.  7 

The  family  acres  Laving  gone  to  the  eldest  brother,  our  hero 
proceeded  with  his  specific  legacy,  well  oiled  and  primed,  to 
Dublin,  having  no  other  fortune  than  the  family  pistols,  and  a 
couple  of  hundred  pounds,  when  he  was  called,  in  the  year 
1770,  to  the  Bar.  The  period  is  so  remote,  that  no  account  of 
his  earlier  exploits,  beyond  that  of  his  habitual  substitution  of 
the  canons  of  chivalry  for  those  of  law,  has  remained.  With 
one  of  his  contemporaries,  the  late  Sir  Frederick  Flood,  I 
was  acquainted,  and  I  have  heard  that  eminent  person,  whom 
the  intellectual  aristocracy  of  Wexford  sent  to  supply  the 
place  of  Mr.  Fuller  in  the  British  House  of  Commons,*  occa- 

from  ?"  the  second,  "  Who  has  he  blazed  with  ?"  When  plain  Mr.  Toler,  Lord 
Norbury  quarrelled  with  Sir  Jonah  Barrington.  It  was  in  the  House  of  Com- 
mons, when  Barrington  having  accused  him  of  having  "  a  hand  for  every  man 
and  a  heart  for  nobody"  (which  was  true  to  the  letter),  Toler  gave  a  sharp  re- 
ply, and  hurriedly  retired.  Barrington,  who  understood  his  look,  followed. 
The  Speaker  sent  in  pursuit  of  both  gentlemen.  Barrington  was  overtaken, 
running  down  Nassau  street,  and,  on  his  resistance,  was  bodily  snatched  up,  in 
presence  of  a  shouting  mob  of  grinning  spectators,  and  litei'ally  carried  into  the 
House,  on  a  man's  shoulders.  Toler,  caught  by  his  coat-skirts  being  fastened 
by  a  door,  was  seized,  and  pulled  until  the  skirts  were  separated  from  the  gar- 
ment. The  Speaker  called  on  both  to  give  a  promise  that  the  affair  should  go 
no  farther,  which  Barrington  did  at  once.  Toler  rose  to  speak,  minus  his  skirts, 
and  the  laughter  caused  by  his  appearance  was  increased  when  Curran  grave- 
ly said  that  "  it  was  offering  an  unparalleled  insult  to  the  House,  for  one  hon- 
orable member  to  trim  another  member's  jacket,  within  the  precincts  of  Par- 
liament, and  almost  in  view  of  the  Speaker  himself."  To  the  last,  even  when 
judge,  Norbury  was  anxious  to  display  himself  in  the  duello.  There  is  no 
doubt  that  his  advancement  was  owing  more  to  his  readiness  to  challenge  and 
fight,  than  to  any  merit  as  a  lawyer.  He  valued  his  life  at  nothing  —  a  very 
fair  estimate.  —  M. 

*  Sir  Frederick  Flood  was  member  for  Wexford  County  in  the  Imperial  Par- 
liament, where  he  was  much  laughed  at  for  his  blunders,  his  ostentation,  and 
his  good  temper.  He  used  to  adopt  almost  any  suggestion,  while  making  a 
speech.  Praising  the  Wexford  magistracy  for  their  zeal,  he  suggested,  "  Tl  ey 
ought  to  receive  some  signal  mark  of  vice-regal  favor."  Egan  (commonly 
called  Bully  Egan,  and  judge  of  Dublin  County)  jocularly  whispered,  "and  be 
whipped  at  the  cart's  tail."  Flood,  hearing  the  words,  completed  his  speech 
by  adding  —  "and  be  whipped  at  the  cart's  tail!"  He  did  not  discover  his 
unconscious  mistake,  until  awakened  by  a  shout  of  laughter  from  his  auditors. 
Jack  Fuller  was  an  English  M.  P.,  who  was  the  acknowledged  Parliamentary 
buffoon,  after  the  brilliant  wit  of  Sheridan  ceased  to  enliven  the  Legislature. 
Fuller  was  a  mere  joker  :   Sheridan  a  man  of  genius.  —  M. 


O  LORD    NOBBTJBY. 

sionally  expatiate  on  the  feats  which,  he  used  to  perform  with 
Lord  Norbury,  with  something  of  the  spirit  with  which  Justice 
Shallow  records  his  achievements  at  Clement's  Inn.  "  Oh  the 
mad  days  that  I  have  spent,"  Sir  Frederick  used  to  say,  "  and 
to  think  that  so  many  of  my  old  acquaintances  are  dead  !" 
The  details,  however,  of  his  narrations  have  escaped  me.  I 
had  calculated  that,  as  he  was  a  strict  disciple  of  Abernethy 
(except  when  he  dined  out),  he  would  have  equalled  Oornaro 
in  longevity  ;  but  being  as  abstemious  in  his  dress  as  in  his 
diet,  and  having  denied  himself  the  luxury  of  an  exterior 
integument,  Sir  Frederick  coughed  himself,  a  couple  of  winters 
since,  unexpectedly  away.  I  am,  therefore,  unable  to  resort 
to  any  of  Lord  Norbury's  original  companions,  for  an  authentic 
account  of  the  first  development  of  his  genius  at  the  Irish 
Bar. 

If  that  bar  had  been  constituted  as  it  is  at  present,  at  the 
period  when  Lord  Norbury  was  called,  it  is  difficult  to  imagine 
how  he  could  have  succeeded.  Destitute  of  knowledge,  with 
a  mind  which,  however  shrewd  and  sagacious  in  the  perception 
of  his  own  interests,  was  unused  to  consider,  and  Avas  almost 
incapable  of  comprehending  any  legal  proposition,  he  could 
never  have  risen  to  any  sort  of  eminence,  where  perspicuity  or 
erudition  was  requisite  for  success.  But  the  qualifications  for 
distinction,  at  the  time  when  Lord  Norbury  was  called,  were 
essentially  different  from  what  they  are  at  present.  Endowed 
with  the  lungs  of  Stentor,  and  a  vivacity  of  temperament 
which  sustained  him  in  all  the  turbulence  of  Irish  Nisi  Prius, 
and  superadding  to  his  physical  attributes  for  noise  and  blus- 
ter, a  dauntless  determination,  he  obtained  some  employment 
in  those  departments  of  his  profession,  in  which  merits  of  the 
kind  were  at  that  time  of  value.  His  elder  brother,  Daniel, 
was  elected  member  for  the  county  of  Tipperary,  which  brought 
him  into  connection  with  Government;  but,  besides  his  broth- 
er's vote,  he  is  reported  to  have  intimated  to  the  ministry,  that 
upon  all  necessary  occasions  his  life  should  be  at  their  service. 
The  first  exploit  from  which  his  claims  upon  the  gratitude  of 
the  local  administration  of  the  country  were  chiefly  derived, 
was  the  "putting  down,"  to  use  the  technical  phrase,  of  Mr. 


CHALLENGES   NAPPER   TANDY.  9 

Napper  Tandy.*     The  latter  was  a  distinguished  member  of 
the  Whig  Club,  and  was  a  tribune  of  the  people. 

Tandy  had  set  up  great  pretensions  to  intrepidity,  but, 
having  come  into  collision  with  Lord  Norbury,  manifested  so 
little  alacrity  in  accepting  the  ready  tender  which  was  made 
to  him  by  that  intrepid  loyalist,  that  the  latter  was  considered 
to  have  gained  a  decided  superiority.  Napper  Tandy  re- 
mained lingering  on  the  threshold  of  the  arena,  while  the 
prize-fighter  of  the  ministers  rushed  into  it  at  once,  and  brand- 
ished his  sword  amidst  the  applauses  of  that  party,  of  which 
he  was  thenceforward  the  champion.  The  friends  of  Napper 
Tandy  accounted  for  his  tardiness  in  calling  on  Lord  Norbury 
(who  declared  his  willingness  to  meet  him  in  half  an  hour),  by 
referring  it  to  an  apprehension  that  the  House  of  Commons 
would  interfere;  but  it  seems  probable  that  the  patriot  of  the 
hour  set  a  higher  estimate  upon  his  existence  than  it  merited, 

*  James  Napper  Tandy  was  an  Irishman,  of  good  family,  high  education, 
and  respectable  fortune.  He  was  a  United  Irishman,  and  retired  to  France, 
to  avoid  arrest  in  Ireland.  There  he  received  a  commission,  as  general  of  bri 
gade,  in  one  of  the  expeditions  against  Ireland,  in  1798,  which  came  to  noth- 
ing. The  year  following,  Napper  Tandy  was  in  Hamburgh,  where  the  English 
Government  had  spies,  and  the  local  authorities  surrendered  him,  as  a  prisoner 
claimed  by  England.  Napoleon,  who  was  then  first  consul,  reclaimed  Tandy,  as 
an  officer  in  the  army  of  France,  and  declared  that,  if  a  hair  of  his  head  were 
touched,  an  English  officer  of  equalrank,  taken  prisoner  in  France,  should  be 
hanged.  The  threat  was  a  strong  one,  the  man  likely  to  execute  it,  and,  in- 
stead of  executing  Tandy  as  "  a  traitor,"  England  exchanged  him,  as  a  pris- 
oner-of-war. He  died  in  the  French  service.  Napoleon  levied  a  heavy  fine 
on  the  city  of  Hamburgh  for  their  breach  of  neutrality  in  surrendering  a  French 
officer.  It  should  be  noted  that  Theobald  Wolfe  Tone,  taken  in  arms  in  Le 
Hoche,  a  French  ship-of-wax  which  took  troops  to  Ireland  in  September,  1798, 
had  as  much  right  to  be  reclaimed  by  France,  in  whose  military  office  he  was, 
as  Tandy.  There  was  not  time  to  do  so,  so  rapidly  did  his  trial  and  conviction 
follow  his  capture.  It  is  known  that  Tone  cut  his  throat  in  prison,  to  avoid 
death  on  the  scaffold.  But  it  is  not  generally  known  that  it  was  seriously  dis- 
cussed by  the  Irish  executive,  whether,  "  for  the  sake  of  the  example,"  he 
should  not  be  conducted  to  the  gallows,  half-dead  as  he  was,  and  executed 
forthwith  —  though  to  do  so,  it  would  be  necessary  to  insert  the  halter  within 
the  wound,  and  thereby  probably  tear  the  victim's  head  from  his  body !  Human- 
ity or  the  fear  of  public  exocration  prevailed,  and  Tone  was  suffered  to  die  in 
peace,  after  lingering  for  eight  days    i  mortal  pain.  — M. 

}* 


10  LORD   NORBURY. 

while  Lord  Norbury  rated  himself  at  his  real  value,  and  did 
not  "  set  his  life  at  a  pin's  fee." 

After  this  affair,  which  mainly  contributed  to  the  matting  of 
his  fortunes,  the  minister  determined  to  turn  the  principal 
talent  which  he  appeared  to  possess,  and  of  which  he  had 
given  so  conspicuous  a  proof  to  farther  account.  In  the  Irish 
House  of  Commons,  the  government  party,  when  hard  pressed, 
converted  the  debate  into  a  sort  of  sanguinary  burletta,  in 
which  Lord  Norbury,  then  Sergeant  Toler,  and  Sir  Boyle 
Roche,*  of  blundering  memory,  were  their  favorite  performers. 

*  Sir  Boyle  Roche  was 'an  Irish  Baronet,  who  had  a  seat  in  Parliament,  and 
was  the  droll  of  the  House.  He  was  famous  for  his  bulls  —  which,  though  the 
expression  might  be  incorrect,  generally  involved  aphorisms  of  sound  sense. 
He  was  of  respectable  family  —  with  a  claim  to  the  title  of  Viscount  Fermoy,  but 
never  urging  it.  Once,  when  it  was  stated,  on  a  money-grant,  that  it  was  unjust 
to  saddle  posterity  with  a  debt  incurred  to  benefit  the  present  generation,  Sir 
Boyle  rose  up  and  said,  "  Why  should  we  beggar  ourselves  to  benefit  posterity  ? 
What  has  posterity  done  for  us?"  The  laugh  which  followed  rather  surprised 
him,  as  he  was  unconscious  of  his  blunder.  He  explained :  "  Sir,  by  posterity 
I  do  not  mean  our  ancestors,  but  those  who  come  immediately  after  them." 
—  Arguing  in  favor  of  a  harsh  Government  measure,  he  urged  that  it  would  be 
better  to  give  up  not  only  a  part,  but  even  the  whole  of  the  constitution,  to  pre- 
serve the  remainder.11 — On  another  occasion,  as  a  free  translation  of 

"  Tu  no  cede  malis,  sed  contra  audentior  ito," 
he  said  "  The  best  way  to  avoid  danger,  is  to  meet  it  plump."— Comipla.ming  of 
the  smallness  of  wine-bottles,  he  suggested  that  a  bill  should  be  passed  enact- 
ing that  every  quart-bottle  should  hold  a  quart. —  He  married  Sir  John  Cave's  eld- 
est daughter,  and  boasted  that  if  he  had  an  older  one,  Sir  John  would  have  given 
her  to  him. — Fearing  the  progress  of  revolutionary  opinions,he  drew  a  frightful  pic- 
ture of  the  future,  remarking  that  the  House  of  Commons  might  be  invaded  by 
ruffians  who,  said  he,  "  would  cut  us  to  mince-meat  and  throw  our  bleeding  heads 
on  that  table,  to  stare  us  in  the  face." — Arguing  in  favor  of  the  Union  of  Ireland 
with  England,  he  said  (rather  wittily)  that"  there  was  no  Levitical  degrees  be- 
twer  n  nations,  and,  on  this  occasion,  he  saw  neither  sin  nor  shame  in  marrying  our 
own  sister." — He  brought  in  a  bill  for  the  improvement  of  the  Dublin  police, 
who  were  in  the  habit  of  sleeping  on  their  post,  at  night,  and  introduced  a 
clause  to  the  effect  that  "  every  watchman  should  be  compelled  to  sleep  in  the 
daytime."  On  this,  another  member  ai'ose  and  begged  to  be  included  in  that 
clause,  by  name,  "  as  he  was  troubled  with  the  gout  and  sometimes  could  not 
sleep  by  night  or  day." — He  assisted  in  preparing  a  bill  to  provide  for  the  erec- 
tion of  a  new  jail  in  Dublin,  and  stated  that  the  new  prison  should  be  built  on 
tho  site  and  with  the  materials  of  the  old  one,  and  that  the  prisoners  should 


SIR   BOYLE    EOCHE    AND    HIS   BULLS.  11 

When  Grattan  Lad  ignited  the  House  of  Commons,  and  suc- 
ceeded in  awakening  some  recollections  of  public  virtue  in  that 
corrupt  and  prostituted  assembly,  or  when  Mr.  Ponsonby,  the 
leader  of  the  Whig  aristocracy,  had,  by  his  clear  and  simple 
exposition  of  the  real  interests  of  the  county7,  brought  a  reluc- 
tant conviction  of  their  duty  to  those  who  were  most  interested  in 
shutting  it  out,  finding  themselves  unequal  to  cope  in  eloquence 
with  the  one,  or  in  argument  with  the  other,  the  government 
managers  produced  Sir  Boyle  Roche  and  Sergeant  Toler  upon 
the  scene. 

On  Grattan  the  experiment  of  bullying  was  not  tried,  for  his 
nX'mness  was  too  well  known.  Sir  Boyle  was,  therefore,  ap- 
pointed to  reply  to  him,  as  his  absurdities  were  found  to  be 
useful  in  restoring  the  House  to  that  moral  tone,  from  which 
the  elevating  declamation  of  the  greatest  speaker  of  his  time 
had  for  a  moment  raised  them.  Under  the  influence  of  Sir 
Boyle's  blunders,  which  were  in  part  intended,  the  Irish  legis- 
lators recovered  their  characteristic  pleasantry,  and  "made 
merry  of  a  nation's  woes  ;"  while  Sergeant  Toler,  who  almost 
equalled   Sir  Boyle  in  absurdity,  and  was  more  naturally,  be- 

continue  to  reside  in  the  old  prison  until  the  new  one  was  completed  !  —  Bar- 
rington  states  that  the  postillion  of  Lord  Lisle  having-  been  mulcted  in  damages 
for  crim.  con.  with  Lady  Lisle,  and  imprisoned  in  default  of  payment,  and  an 
applicant  for  relief  as  an  Insolvent  Debtor,  which  the  Legislature  resisted,  Sir 
Boyle  Roche  argued  for  him  (and  with  much  plausibility)  that  "Lady  Lisle, 
and  not  Dennis  M'Carthy,  must  have  been  the  real  seducer,"  and  concluded 
by  asking  "  Mi*.  Speaker,  what  was  this  poor  servant's  crime?  —  Sure,  it  was 
only  doing  his  master's  business  by  his  mistress's  order." — Curran  used  to  say 
that  Sir  Boyle  Roche  had  a  rival  in  an  Irish  Judge,  who  sagely  contended,  in 
an  argument  on  the  construction  of  a  will,  that  "  it  appeared  to  him  that  the 
testator  meant  to  keep  a  life  interest  in  the  estate  to  himself."  Curran  an- 
swered, "  True,  my  Lord  ;  testators  do  generally  secure  a  life  interest  for  them- 
selves, but  in  this  case,  I  rather  think  you  take  the  icill  for  the  deed."  Sir  Boyle 
Roche's  bulls  illustrated  what  may  be  called  arguing  wrongly  from  right  prem- 
ises. To  illustrate  this,  let  me  add  a  bull  by  another.  Two  Irishmen  met, 
after  a  long  separation,  and  to  an  inquiry  after  the  health  of  a  third  person,  the 
reply  was,  "  Oh,  he's  been  ill.  He's  had  the  fever.  It  has  worn  him  down,  as 
thin  as  a  thread-paper.  You  are  thin,  and  /  am  thin,  but  he  is  thinner  than 
Loth  of  us  put  together."  Here  the  idea  is  fully  conveyed,  but,  in  the  hurry  of 
clothing  the  thought  with  language,  the  mode  of  expression  is  incorrect.  And 
sucb  is  that  amusing  thing  —  an  Irish  Bull. —  M. 


12  LORD  NOEBUKY. 

cause  he  was  involuntarily  extravagant,  played  his  part,  and 
was  let  loose  upon  Mr.  Ponsonby,  whose  nerves  were  of  a  deli- 
cate organization,  with  singular  effect.  That  eminent  states- 
man had  made  a  speech,  recommending  Catholic  Emancipa- 
tion, and  other  collateral  measures,  as  the  only  means  of  rescu- 
ing Ireland  from  the  ruin  which  impended  over  her.  He  was 
always  remarkable  for  the  dignified  urbanity  of  his  manners, 
and  in  the  speech  to  which  Sergeant  Toler  replied,  scarcely 
any  man  but  Toler  could  have  found  materials  for  personal 
vituperation. 

The  English  reader  will  be  able  to  form  some  idea  of  the 
system  on  which  the  debates  of  the  Irish  House  of  Commons 
were  carried  on,  and  to  estimate  Lord  Norbury's  powers  of 
minacious  oratory,  from  the  following  extract  from  the  parlia- 
mentary debates  :  "  What  was  it  come  to,  that  in  the  Irish 
House  of  Commons  they  should  listen  to  one  of  their  own 
members  degrading  the  character  of  an  Irish  gentleman  by 
language  which  was  fitted  but  for  hallooing  a  mob  1  Had  he 
heard  a  man  uttering  out  of  those  doors  such  language  as  that 
by  which  the  honorable  gentleman  had  violated  the  decorum 
of  Parliament,  he  would  have  seized  the  ruffian  by  the  throat, 
and  dragged  him  to  the  dust !  What  were  the  House  made 
of,  who  could  listen  in  patience  to  such  abominable  sentiments? 
sentiments,  thank  God !  which  were  acknowledged  by  no 
class  of  men  in  this  country,  except  the  execrable  and  infamous 
nest  of  traitors,  who  were  known  by  the  name  of  United  Irish- 
men, who  sat  brooding  in  Belfast  over  their  discontents  and 
treasons,  and  from  whose  publications  he  could  trace,  word  for 
word,  every  expression  the  honorable  gentleman  had  used." — 
Irish  Parliamentary  Debates,  Feb.,  1797. 

Of  this  fragment  of  vituperation  Mr.  Ponsonby  took  no  no- 
tice;  and  the  object  of  the  orator  was  attained,  in  securing 
himself  a  new  title  to  the  gratitude  of  those  who  kept  a  band 
of  bravoes  hired  in  their  service,  and  could  not  have  selected 
a  more  appropriate  instrument  than  Lord  Norbury  for  the  pur- 
poses of  intimidation.  To  his  personal  courage,  or  rather 
recklessness  of  the  lives  of  others  as  well  as  his  own,  he  is 
chiefly  indebted  for  his  promotion.     It  was  the  leading  trait 


HIS    PROMOTION.  13 

of  his  character,  and,  prevailing  over  Lis  extravagance,  invested 
him  with  a  sort  of  spurious  respectability.  In  the  manifesta- 
tions of  that  spirit,  which  had  become  habitual,  he  has  perse- 
vered to  the  last;  and  even  since  he  has  been  a  Chief-Justice 
has  betrayed  his  original  tendency  to  settle  matters  after  the 
old  Irish  fashion,  at  the  distance  of  twelve  paces.  He  has 
more  than  once  intimated  to  a  counsel,  who  was  pressing  him 
too  closely  with  a  Bill  of  Exceptions,  that  he  would  not  seek 
shelter  behind  the  bench,  or  merge  the  gentleman  in  the  Chief- 
Justice  ;  and,  when  a  celebrated  senator  charged  him  with 
having  fallen  asleep  on  a  trial  for  murder,  he  is  reported  to 
have  declared  that  he  would  resign,  in  order  to  demand  satis- 
faction, as  "  that  Scotch  Broom  (Brougham)  wanted  nothing  so 
much  as  an  Irish  stick" 

In  the  year  1798,  Lord  Norbuiy  was  his  Majesty's  Solicitor- 
General.  His  services  to  Government  had  beeii  hitherto  con- 
fined to  the  display  of  ferocious  rhetoric  in  the  House  of  Com- 
mons, of  which  I  have  quoted  a  specimen.  The  civil  disturb- 
ances of  the  country  offered  a  new  field  to  his  genius,  and 
afforded  him  an  opportunity  of  accumulating  his  claims  upon 
the  gratitude  of  the  Crown,  which  could  not  have  found  a  more 
zealous,  and,  I  will  even  add,  a  more  useful  servant  during  the 
rebellion.  If  the  juries  before  whom  the  hordes  who  were 
charged  with  high  treason  Avere  put  upon  their  trial,  had  been 
either  scrupulous  or  reluctant,  if  any  questions  of  effectual 
difficulty  could  have  arisen,  and  the  forms  of  the  law  could 
have  been  used  with  any  chance  of  success  in  the  defence  of 
the  prisoners,  if  Justice  had  not  rushed  with  eagerness  through 
every  impediment,  and  broken  all  ceremony  down,  such  a 
Solicitor-General  as  Lord  Norbury  would  have  been  an  inap- 
plicable and  inefficient  instrument;  but  the  evidence  of  in- 
formers was  generally  so  direct  and  simple,  and  so  strong  was 
the  impatience  of  juries  to  precipitate  themselves  to  a  convic- 
tion, all  niceties  and  technicalities  of  the  law  were  so  utterly 
disregarded,  and  it  was  so  little  requisite  that  the  conductors 
of  Government  prosecutions  should  possess  either  acuteness  or 
knowledge,  that  Lord  Norbnry's  faculties  were  quite  equal  to 
the  discharge  of  his  official  duty,  while  they  were  in  happy 


14  LORD    NORBURY. 

adaptation  to  the  moral  character  of  the  public  tribunals,  and 
the  exigency  of  the  time. 

To  strike  terror  into  the  people  was  the  great  object  to  be 
attained,  and  Lord  Norbmy  had  many  qualifications  for  the 
purpose.  He  stood  in  a  court  of  justice,  not  only  as  the  servant 
of  his  sovereign,  but  as  the  representative,  in  some  measure, 
of  the  powerful  Cromwellian  aristocracy  to  which  his  family 
belonged,  and  in  whose  prejudices  and  passions  he  himself 
vehemently  participated.  His  whole  bearing  and  aspect 
breathed  a  turbulent  spirit  of  domination.  His  voice  was  deep 
and  big ;  and  in  despite  of  the  ludicrous  associations  connected 
with  his  character,  when  it  rolled  the  denunciations  of  infuri- 
ated power  through  the  court,  derived  from  the  terrible  intima- 
tions which  it  conveyed,  an  awful  and  appalling  character. 
He  did  not,  indeed,  cease  to  utter  absurdity,  but  his  orations 
were  fraught  with  a  kind  of  truculent  bombast  —  a  sort  of  san- 
guinary "fee,  fa,  fum  !"  while  the  dilation  of  his  nostrils,  and 
the  fierceness  of  his  look,  expressed,  if  I  may  so  say,  the  scent 
of  a  traitor's  blood.*     In  his  moments  of  excitation  (and  he  is 

*  It  may  seem  uncharitable  to  pronounce  such  an  opinion,  but  there  appear 
strong  grounds  for  thinking  that  Lord  Norbury,  as  a  Judge,  felt  a  sort  of  mor- 
bid pleasure  in  presiding  at  the  trial,  and  (what  under  him  was  pretty  sure  to 
follow)  the  conviction  of  persons  prosecuted  by  the  Government.  During  the 
fatal  and  blood-stained  year  of  1798,  he  was  Attorney-General,  and  had  the 
task  —  if  task  it  were  to  him  who  could  say  of  it,  "  The  duty  I  delight  in  physics 
pain" — of  conducting  the  State  Trials.  In  my  youth,  when  I  used  to  listen  to 
old  men's  tales  of  the  legal  tortures  and  butcheries  of  '98,  the  narrators  would 
tell  how  "  bloody  Toler"  (as  he  was  called)  strained  every  point  against  pris- 
oners, how  he  would  insist  on  every  quirk  and  quibble  to  convict  them,  how  he 
would  browbeat  the  witnesses,  and  all  but  threaten  the  juries,  and  how  compla- 
cently, when  the  verdict  was  delivered,  he  would  insist  on  the  passing  of  a  sen- 
tence of  immediate  —  of  almost  instant  death.  Such  was  it,  in  the  case  of  the 
Sheareses,  mentioned  in  the  preceding  volume,  where  on  the  part  of  the  Crown, 
he  sternly  refused  their  counsel  the  slightest  pause  for  rest  and  thought,  after  the 
trial  had  already  lasted  sixteen  consecutive  hours  ;  when,  the  verdict  being  re- 
turned at  eight  in  the  morning,  he  had  the  doomed  brothers  brought  up  that 
6ame  afternoon,  for  judgment ;  how  he  insisted  on  their  execution  taking  place 
the  next  morning;  and  1  ow  the  condemnation  was  literally  forced,  by  him,  on 
the  evidence  of  a  single  and  tainted  witness,  the  law  of  England  requiring  two 
to  establish  an  overt-ac;  of  high  treason.  Then,  too,  while  Lord  Norbury's 
name  was  uttered  vr'.th  ♦  curses  both  loud  and   deep,"  I  used  to  hear  of  this 


emmett's  trial.  15 

capable  of  ascending  beyond  the  level  of  ordinary  feeling  and 
discourse)  bis  spirit  was  strongly  roused,  and  bis  countenance, 
Bwelled  as  it  was  with  passion,  and  stained  with  a  dark  red, 
became  the  image  of  his  intellect  and  of  his  sensibility.  His 
eyes  were  inflamed  with  a  ferocious  loyalty,  and  the  conscious- 
ness of  unbounded  power;  and  while  they  glared  on  the 
wretches  who  stood  pale  and  trembling  at  the  bar,  or  were 
fixed  in  defiance  on  the  counsel  for  the  prisoner,  assisted,  with 

man's  inhuman  bearing  toward  Robert  Emmett  —  the  kindest,  most  chivalric, 
and  ti'uest  man  that  ever  breathed;  wbo,  like  Lord  Edward  Fitzgerald,  might 
have  escaped,  but,  like  him,  declined  to  find  safety  in  flight,  leaving  other  and 
meaner  partners  in  tbe  revolt  to  face  the  peril  and  the  death-doom.  Emmett, 
from  the  first,  did  not  deny  his  conspiracy  against  the  English  misrule  which 
had  reduced  his  country  from  independence  to  its  opposite  —  from  a  kingdom  to 
a  province.  All  through,  he  was  chiefly  anxious  to  show  that  he  never  contem- 
plated establishing  French  power  in  Ireland  —  of  substituting  one  tyranny  for 
another.  In  the  speech  which  he  made,  after  conviction,  when  called  upon  to 
6ay  why  judgment  of  death  should  not  pass,  he  strongly  urged  this  :  —  "  Small, 
indeed,"  said  he,  "  would  be  our  claim  to  patriotism  and  sense,  and  palpable  our 
affectation  of  the  love  of  liberty,  if  we  were  to  sell  our  country  to  a  people  who 
are  not  only  slaves  themselves,  but  the  unprincipled  and  abandoned  instruments 
of  imposing  slavery  on  others."  In  this  vindication  of  his  motives,  Emmett 
was  repeatedly  and  roughly  interrupted  by  Norbury.  Then  came  the  sharp 
"  You,  my  lord,  are  a  judge.  I  am  the  supposed  culprit.  I  am  a  man  —  you 
are  a  man  also.  By  a  revolution  of  power  we  might  change  places,  though 
we  never  could  change  characters."  And  then  the  defiance:  "There  are  men 
concerned  in  this  conspiracy  who  are  not  only  superior  to  me,  but  even  to  your 
own  conceptions  of  yourself,  my  lord  —  men  before  the  splendor  of  whose  genius 
and  virtues  I  should  bow  with  respectfid  deference,  and  who  would  not  deign 
to  call  you  friend  —  who  would  not  disgrace  themselves  by  shaking  your  blood- 
stained hand."  The  Government  of  that  day  suspected  that  three  noblemen  were 
in  this  conspiracy  —  one  of  whom,  on  what  suspicion  or  proof  is  unknown,  was 
the  late  Lord  Cloncurry,  who  was  arrested.  It  was  a  belief  in  Ireland,  from  the 
time  that  Robert  Emmett  was  executed,  that  Lord  Norbury  would  meet  a  doom 
as  tragical.  He  lived  on,  however,  like  the  Thane  of  Cawdor,  "  a  prosperous 
gentleman."  Boundless  wealth  idled  his  coffers.  Worldly  honors  crowded  upon 
him.  At  last  he  died.  But  the  Irish  remembered  how  the  sins  of  the  fathers 
are  visited  on  the  sons.  Eight  years  after  Lord  Norbury's  death,  his  succes- 
sor was  shot  on  his  own  demesne  of  Durrow  Abbey,  and,  to  this  hour,  there  has 
been  no  detection  of  the  assassin.  As  if  to  make  it  more  inexplicable,  the 
doomed  man  was  a  good  landlord  —  as  landlords  are  estimated  in  Ireland. 
He  was  neither  absentee,  nor  exacting,  nor  litigious.  He  was  simply  the 
representative  of  the  blood-stained  judge,  and  the  shaft  of  vengeance  fell  upop 
kirn,— -M. 


16  LORD  NORBURr. 

their  savage  glare,  the  canons  of  extermination  which  the 
orator  was  laying  down.  A  certain  trick  of  expanding  his 
cheeks,  and  swelling  them  with  wind,  which  he  puffed  impor- 
tantly off,  set  off  his  tempestuous  adjurations,  and  made  him 
look  as  if  he  were  blowing  all  mercy  and  compunction  away. 
Thus  he  was  every  way  well  adapted  to  his  terrible  task. 

Nor  was  he  less  qualified,  when,  in  his  capacity  of  Solicitor- 
General,  he  was  put  on  the  commission,  and  went  as  a  judge 
of  assize.  Much  of  the  same  demeanor  and  deportment  was 
preserved  on  the  bench,  where  the  red  robes  in  which  he  was 
arrayed  heightened  the  impression  which  his  face,  voice,  and 
figure,   were   calculated    to   produce.*     There   was,   however, 

*  Norbury's  personal  appearance  was  very  remarkable.  He  was  more,  than 
eighty  when  I  first  saw  him,  and  resembled  a  caricatured  character  in  a  panto- 
mime rather  than  a  grave  judicial  personage.  Charles  Phillips  said  of  him 
that  "  the  chivalry  of  Quixote  was  incased  in  the  paunch  of  Sancho  Panza,"  but 
Chivalry  and  Norbury  were  antipodes,  not  synonymes.  He  had  a  sort  of  animal 
courage,  or  insensibility  to  danger,  but  was  innocent  of  the  gallant  delight 

"Which  warriors  feel 
In  foemen  worthy  of  their  steel." 
He  was  nearly  as  broad  as  he  was  long,  with  a  large  and  rubicund  face ;  small 
and  twinkling  eyes,  and  a  curious  expression  of  ferret-like  keenness,  resulting, 
in  all  likelihood,  from  his  being  perpetually  on  the  watch  for  the  opportunity 
of  a  joke.  His  laugh  was  so  hearty  as  to  be  infectious.  Like  Hamlet,  he  was 
"fat  and  scant  of  breath,"  and,  was  perpetually  puffing  —  like  an  asthmatic  lo- 
comotive. From  this,  though  resembling  the  German  civilian  in  nothing,  he 
had  obtained  the  soubriquet  of  Puffendorf.  On  the  bench,  he  would  pant,  and 
pun,  and  puff,  chuckling  with  glee  at  the  laughter  he  created,  until,  as  the  fun 
came  faster  and  faster,  and  the  buffo  gi-ew  hotter  and  hotter,  he  would  let  his 
judicial  robe  fall  from  his  shoulders,  shift  his  judicial  wig  to  obtain  ventilation, 
and  return  it  to  his  head,  with  the  tails,  most  probably,  hanging  before  instead 
of  behind  !  On  one  occasion,  Lady  Castlereagh  gave  a  fancy-ball,  at  which 
Lord  Norbury  appeared  as  Hawthorn,  in  "  Love  in  a  Village,"  and  was  extremely 
amusing.  His  dress  was  a  green  tabinet,  with  mother-of-pearl  buttons,  striped 
yellow  and  black  vest,  and  black  breeches.  If  showy,  the  attire,  from  its  ma- 
terials, was  light.  When  Norbury  next  went  the  Circuit,  as  judge,  this  fancy- 
dress  found  its  way  into  one  of  his  travelling  trunks.  The  weather  was  warm 
the  sitting  of  the  Court  would  last  for  seven  or  eight  hours,  the  dress  was  thin 
—  Norbury  donned  it,  and  covered  with  his  ample  judicial  robes,  no  one  could 
see  it.  By-and-by,  the  heat  became  almost  intolerable.  Norbury  gave  his  wig 
♦he  usual  twitch  to  the  side ;  then  he  turned  up  the  sleeves  of  his  robe ;  next, 
he  loosened  the  girdle  which  confined  it  round  his  waist;  and,  lastly,  when 
the  loosened  envelope  had  gradually  opened,  there  was  the  Chief  Justice  gegn 


INDIFFEKENCE    FOR   LIFE.  IT 

this  difference,  that  his  spirit  of  buffoonery  became  more  con* 
spicuous  upon  the  bench.  It  should  not,  however,  be  too  has- 
tily concluded  that  his  love  of  drollery  in  any  degree  disquali- 
fied him  for  the  exercise  of  the  judicial  functions.  On  the 
contrary,  his  merits  as  a  jester  were  among  his  most  useful 
and  efficient  attributes  as  a  judge.  He  was  fanciful  or  turgid, 
just  as  the  occasion  required. 

In  his  addresses  to  the  jury,  he  was  as  swollen  with  exag- 
gerated loyalty  as  the  gravest  supporter  of  Protestant  Ascen- 
dency could  have  desired  ;  while  during  the  rest  of  the  trial, 
he  put  on  a  demeanor  of  heedless  hilarity,  which  indicated  the 
little  value  which  he  attached  to  the  life  of  an  insurgent,  and 
taught  the  populace  at  what  rate  human  breath  was  estimated 
in  his  court.  The  effect  of  the  tortures  of  Macbriar,  in  "  Old 
Mortality,"  is  greatly  heightened  by  the  merriment  by  which 
the  Duke  of  Lauderdale  exclaims,  "He  will  make  an  old  prov- 
erb good,  for  he'll  scarce  ride  to-day,  though  he  has  had  his 
boots  on."  I  do  not,  however,  believe  that  the  indifference  for 
human  life  which  was  indicated  by  Lord  Norbury's  judicial 
mirth,  was  at  all  studied  or  systematic,  or  the  result  of  cruelty 
of  disposition.     He  is  naturally  of  a  gay  and  pleasant  cast  of 

in  his  Hawthorn  dress,  chuckling  over  the  jokes  with  which  he  amused  himself 
and  the  Court  in  the  intervals  between  the  graver  business  of  sentencing  cul- 
prits to  be  hanged. —  He  was  usually  very  polite  to  prisoners.  On  one  occasion, 
when  he  had  to  sentence  half  a  dozen,  he  had  them  all  brought  up,  in  a  batch, 
and,  severally  naming  five  of  them,  pronounced  judgment  of  death.  An  officer 
of  the  Court  reminded  his  Lordship  that  he  had  missed  one.  The  convict  was 
sent  for.  "  My  good  man,"  said  Norbuiy,  blowing  like  a  grampus,  "  I've  made 
a  mistake  about  you,  and  I  really  must  beg  your  pardon  [pufT  puff  puff],  I 
should  have  sentenced  you  with  the  rest  [puff]  and  quite  omitted  your  name 
[puff] — pray  excuse  me.  The  sentence  of  the  law  is  [puff]  that  you,  Darby 
Mahony  [puff]  — I  really  wonder  how  I  came  to  pass  you  over  —  be  taken  hence 
to  prison,  and  from  prison  to  the  place  of  execution  [puff]  and  there  hanged 
by  the  neck  until  you  are  dead  [puff]  —  I  do  hope  you  will  excuse  my  mistake  — ■ 
and  may  the  Lord  [puff]  have  mercy  on  your  soul.  That's  all,  my  good  man 
[puff]  —  turnkey,  remove  Darby  Mahony."  The  victim  coolly  turned  round 
as  he  was  quitting  the  dock,  exclaiming,  "  Faith,  my  Lord,  I  can't  thank  you 
for  your  prayers,  for  I  never  heard  of  any  one  that  throve  after  your  making 
them!"  Norbuiy,  who  relished  a  retort,  actually  granted  Darby  a  reprieve  be- 
fore leaving  the  assize-town,  and  successfully  recommended  him  for  a  commuta- 
tion of  punishment  on  his  return  to  Dublin, —  M. 


18  LORD  NORBURY. 

mind ;  and  it  is,  I  fancy,  impossible  for  him  to  keep  ludicrous 
notions  out.  It  is  also  but  justice  to  him  to  add,  tli at  Lis  jokes 
were  not,  like  the  Duke  of  Lauderdale's,  at  the  expense  of  the 
prisoner,  who  stood  aghast  and  dismayed  before  him  ;  and  if 
they  showed  that  he  did  not  entertain  any  very  profound  sense 
of  the  awfulness  of  the  transition  to  another  state  of  existence, 
still,  as  they  were  not  directed  to  the  culprit  at  the  bar,  his 
witticisms  gave  no  indications  of  natural  savageness  of  heart, 
from  which  I  believe  him  to  be  wholly  free.  His  imagination 
was  hurried  away  by  some  whimsical  idea,  and  the  moment  a 
grotesque  image  presented  itself,  or  a  fantastical  anecdote  was 
recalled  to  his  recollection,  he  could  not  keep  it  in,  but  let  it 
involuntarily  escape  upon  the  court. 

But  these  vagaries  did  not  render  the  administration  of  jus- 
tice in  his  hands  less  terrific;  and  while  he  himself  gave  way 
to  the  merriment  which  he  could  not  restrain,  the  countenances 
of  the  crowds  with  which  the  public  tribunals  were  filled,  in  their 
fearful  expression,  as  well  as  their  ghastly  color,  exhibited  an 
awful  contrast  with  his  own.  He  could,  indeed,  with  impunity 
indulge  in  these  judicial  antics  amid  the  assemblage  of  pallid 
wretches  by  whom  he  was  surrounded ;  when  it  might  be  justly 
said,  in  reference  to  them  and  to  the  moral  expression  of  his 
visage  and  its  complexion,  "  Gum  tot  pallorlbus  sufficeret  scevus 
istc  vultus,  atque  rubor,  quo  se  contra  pudorem  muniebat."  In 
his  charges,  too,  he  made  ample  compensation  for  the  conun- 
drums with  which  he  interrupted  the  examination  of  witnesses; 
for  he  threw  off  in  an  instant  the  character  of  a  jester,  resum- 
ed the  terrors  of  his  deep  and  denunciating  voice,  and  turning 
to  the  prisoners,  spoke  of  that  eternity  to  which  he  was  about 
to  despatch  them,  with  an  awfulness  and  solemnity  which  jus- 
tified Lord  Clare,  who  objected  to  his  being  created  a  Chief- 
Justice,  in  recommending  that  he  should  enter  the  church,  and 
be  made  a  bishop. 

The  proposition  that  those  brows,  on  which  the  black  cap 
had  been  so  frequently  and  so  conspicuously  displayed,  should 
be  invested  with  a  mitre,  did  credit  to  Lord  Clare,  who,  with 
all  his  partiality  for  the  church,  was  more  solicitous  for  the 
dignity  of  the  judicial  than  the  episcopal  bench;   and  had  his. 


CHIEF- JUSTICE   CARLETON".  19 

suggestion  been  adopted,  Lord  Norbury,  attired  in  lawn,  would 
Lave  proved  an  agreeable  accession  to  the  House  of  Lords,  and 
while  lie  relieved  the  tedium  of  many  a  weary  debate  with  his 
pious  jokes  and  his  holy  merriment,  he  would  in  all  likelihood 
have  looked  as  appropriate  a  successor  of  the  apostles  as  their 
lordships  of  Ossory  or  Kilmore.  If  he  had  been  created  Aich- 
bishop  of  Dublin,  what  a  spirit  of  good  humor  would  have  been 
infused  into  our  polemics ;  how  many  a  sacred  jest  would  have 
sparkled  in  his  jovial  and  laughter-stirring  homilies !  We 
should  have  been  spared  a  fierce  and  unprovoked  aggression  on 
the  religion  of  the  people,  and  should  never  have  seen  a  barb- 
ed and  envenomed  arrow  shot  from  behind  the  altar,  in  shape 
of  a  wanton  and  virulent  antithesis.  Lord  Norbury  officiating 
as  Archbishop  of  Dublin,  presents  a  pleasant  picture  to  the 
mind,  and  of  a  character  as  truly  Christian  as  the  reality 
affords. 

Unfortunately,  however,  Lord.  Clare  was  overruled  ;  and. 
Lord  Norbury,  having  been  created  a  peer,  was  raised  to  the 
Chief-Justiceship  of  the  Common  Pleas,  on  the  resignation  of 
Lord  Carleton.*  For  some  time  the  terrors  which  had  attend- 
ed him  during  the  rebellion,  continued  to  be  associated  with 
his  name  ;  but  at  length  the  recollections  of  the  civil  commotions 
in  which  he  had  played  so  remarkable  a  part,  began  to  subside 

*  Hugh  Carleton,  bom  at  Cork  in  1739,  was  called  to  the  Irish  bar  after 
completing  bis  education  at  Dublin  University.  He  had  little  success  for  some 
years,  but  rose  to  the  office  of  Solicitor-General  in  1779,  which  he  retained 
until  the  appointment  of  the  Duke  of  Portland,  as  Viceroy.  He  was  made 
Chief-Justice  of  the  Common  Pleas,  in  1787;  created  Baron  Carleton  in  1789, 
and  raised  to  the  rank  of  Viscount  in  1797.  After  the  Union,  and  when  he  had 
quitted  tbe  judicial  bench,  Lord  Carleton  sat  in  the  Imperial  Parliament,  as 
one  of  the  Irish  Representative  peers.  He  was  very  unpopular  in  Ireland  — 
chiefly  owing  to  his  harsh  conduct  toward  the  Sheareses,  in  1798,  when  presi- 
ding at  their  trial,  as  previously  related  in  page  99  of  first  volume.  He  allowed 
them  nothing  like  fair  play  in  compelling  their  advocate,  Mr.  Curran,  to  enter 
on  their  defence,  at  midnight,  after  the  trial  had  already  lasted  sixteen  hours. 
In  1803,  during  Emmett's  insurrection,  when  the  populace  met  the  carriage  of 
Lord  Kilwarden,  Chief-Justice  of  the  Queen's  Bench,  who  was  rather  popular, 
he  was  mistaken  for  Carleton,  Chief-Justice  of  the  Common  Pleas,  and  liter- 
ally killed  by  mistake.  Lord  Carleton  had  such  a  melancholy  aspect  and  lu- 
gubrious manner  that  Curran  declared  him  to  be  plaintiff  (plaintive)  In  every 
case  that  came  before  him. —  M. 


20  LORD  NORBURY. 

—  liis  ei.ergy  in  tlie  cause  of  government  was  forgotten  — nohG 
but  the  ridiculous  points  of  Lis  character  stood  out  in  any  very 
considerable  prominence,  and  he  lost  even  that  species  of  re- 
spect which  results  from  fear. 

He  was  Chief-Justice  of  the  Common  Pleas  from  the  year 
1800,  and  diligently  employed  the  whole  of  that  period  in 
earning  the  reputation  which  he  at  length  succeeded  in  estab- 
lishing through  the  empire.  "Lord  Norbury's  last  joke"  has 
long  been  the  ordinary  title  to  a  pleasant  paragraph  in  the 
English  newspapers  :*  but  it  is  right  to  add,  in  his  vindication, 

*  A  vast  number  of  puns,  each  paragraphed  as  "  Lord  Norbmy's  Last,"  ap- 
peared in  the  Irish  newspapers  in  his  lifetime.  Eveiy  editor  who  made  a  joke 
sent  it  upon  the  world  as  one  of  the  Norbury  family.  His  own  jests  were  bet- 
ter than  most  of  the  imitations.  A- man  of  his  rank  was  tried  before  him  for 
arson,  and  acquitted.  The  populace  shrewdly  gave  the  name  of  "  Moscow"  to 
the  ruins  of  his  house.  Norbury  met  him  soon  after,  at  a  Castle  levee.  "  Glad 
to  meet  you  here"  said  the  judge.     "  This  is  my  last  bachelor's  visit,  my  lord: 

I  am  going  to  turn  Benedict."  Norbury  looked  him  full  in  the  face  while  he 
responded,  "Ay,  St.  Paul  says  better  marry  than  burn.11  —  When  giving  judg- 
ment on  a  writ  of  right,  he  declared  that  it  was  insufficient  for  a  demandant 
to  say  he  "claimed  by  descent.  Such  an  answer,"  he  continued,  "would  be 
a  shrewd  one  for  a  sweep,  who  had  entered  your  house,  by  getting  down  the 
chimney ;  and  it  would  be  an  easy,  as  well  as  a  sweeping  way,  of  getting  in." — 
A  marine  officer  having  canvassed  for  a  directorship  in  the  National  Assurance 
Company  of  Ireland  (there  really  was  such  a  body!)  Lord  Norbury  stated  that 
he  was  veiy  eligible,  no  doubt,  from  his  experience  in  marine  risks,  his  having 
received  premiums  for  taking  lives,  and  for  having  himself  escaped  all  dam- 
ages from  fire,  though  following  a  profession  doubly  hazardous  ;  "  but,"  he 
added,  "inasmuch  as  the  Captain  does  not  hold  the  requisite  number  of  shares 
to  qualify  him,  it  is  clear  that  his  want  of  a  sufficient  stock  of  assurance  is  an 
insurmountable  bar  to  his  election." — At  Naas,  on  circuit,  when  a  Counsel  was 
making  a  speech,  an  ass  brayed  very  loudly  outside,  "  One  at  a  time,  gentle- 
men, if  you  please,"  said  Norbury.  Soon  after,  while  his  Lordship  was  ad- 
dressing the  jury,  the  same  long-eared  quadruped  again  began  to  give  tongue. 

II  What  noise  is  that  ?"  The  counsel  retorted,  "  Only  the  echo  of  the  Court,  my 
Lord  !" — The  Irish  had  great  faith  in  Edmund  Burke's  patriotism,  which  had 
supported  what  was  called  "  The  Independence  of  Ireland,"  viz.,  when  the 
army  of  Volunteers,  associated  in  1779,  compelled  the  British  Ministry  to  re- 
peal the  Statute  of  the  sixth  of  George  L,  declaring  that  Ireland  was  bound  by 
British  acts  of  Parliament,  if  named  therein,  that  the  Irish  House  of  Lords  had 
no  jurisdiction  in  Irish  cases  of  appeal ;  and  that  the  dernier  ressort,  in  all  cases, 
must  be  to  the  peers  of  Great  Britain.  Burke  s  son,  Richard*  was  appointed 
On  a  large  .salary,  to  get  up  the  petition  to  the  Irish  Parliament,  from  the  Irish 


HIS    BTJFFO    PERFORMERS.  21 

that  much  has  been  attributed  to  him  which  does  not  belong 
to  him ;  and  many  a  dealer  in  illegitimate  wit,  who  was 
ashamed  of  acknowledging  his  own  productions,  laid  his  spu- 
rious offspring  at  his  lordship's  door. 

As  he  so  essentially  contributed  to  the  amusement  of  the 
public,  he  gradually  grew  into  the  general  favor,  and  was 
held  in  something  like  the  reverence  which  is  entertained  by 
the  upper  galleries  for  an  eminent  actor  of  farce.  His  per- 
formances at  Nisi  Prius  were  greatly  preferable,  in  the  decline 
of  the  Dublin  stage,  to  any  theatrical  exhibition  ;  and,  as  he 
drew  exceedingly  full  houses,  Mr.  Jones  [patentee  of  Dublin 
Theatre]  began  to  look  at  him  with  some  jealousy,  and  is  said 
to  have  been  advised  by  Mr.  Sergeant  Goold,  who  had  a  share 
of  c£3565  5s.  Q>\d.  in  Crow-street  Theatre,  to  file  a  bill  for  an 
injunction  against  the  Chief-Justice,  for  an  infringement  of  his 
patent.  Lord  Norbury  was  at  the  head  of  an  excellent  com- 
pany. The  spirit  of  the  judge  extended  itself  naturally 
enough  to  the  counsel ;  and  men  who  were  grave  and  consid- 

Catholics.  Ignorant  or  regaixlless  of  the  rules  of  the  House  of  Commons,  young 
Burke  determined,  to  present  the  petition  himself,  and  in  the  body  not  at  the 
bar  of  the  House.  He  had  reached  the  Treasury  bench  before  he  was  per- 
ceived, and  cries  of  "Privilege,"  and  a  "A  stranger  in  the  House"  instantly 
arose.  The  Speaker  sonorously  called  on  the  sergeant-at-arms  to  do  his  duty. 
Dreading  arrest,  Burke  ran  toward  the  bar,  where  he  was  faced  by  the  sergeant 
with  a  drawn  sword ;  returning,  he  was  stopped,  at  the  table,  by  the  clerk.  A 
chase  ensued,  the  members  all  keeping  their  seats,  and,  at  last,  Burke  escaped 
behind  the  Speaker's  chair.  In  the  debate  which  ensued,  the  sergeant-at-arms 
was  blamed  for  not  having  arrested  Burke  at  the  back-door.  Sir  Boyle  Roche 
asked,  with  much  naivete,  "  How  could  the  officer  stop  him  in  the  rear,  while 
he  was  catching  him  in  the  front?"  and  emphatically  declared  that  "no  man 
could  be  in  two  places  at  one  time  —  barring  he  was  a  bird!"  When  the 
laughter  at  this  had  subsided,  Norbury  (then  Mr.  Toler)  said  "A  few  days 
ago,  I  found  an  incident,  like  what  has  just  now  occurred,  in  the  cross-read- 
ings of  the  columns  of  a  newspaper.  'Yesterday  a  petition  was  presented  to 
the  House  of  Commons  —  it  fortunately  missed  fire  and  the  villain  ran  3ff.'  " 
This  renewed  the  mirth,  and  no  further  notice  was  taken  of  Burke's  escapade. 
I  give  the  sally,  to  show  how  near  to  the  confines  of  wit  was  the  apt  readiness 
of  Norbury's  humor. —  He  had  his  joke  to  the  very  last.  His  neighbor  s  Lord 
Erne,  was  far  advanced  in  yeai's  and  bedridden.  When  his  own  health  failed, 
he  heard  of  his  friend's  increased  illness.  "  James,"  said  he  to  his  servant, 
"  go  next  door,  and  tell  Lord  Erne,  with  my  compliments,  that  it  will  be  a 
dead-heat  between  us." — M 


%%  LoiiD  froRStmr. 

erate  everywhere  el&e,  threw  off  all  soberness  and  propriety, 
and  became  infected  with  the  habits  of  the  venerable  manager 
of  the  court,  the  moment  they  entered  the  Common  Pleas. 
His  principal  performers  were  Messrs.  Grady,  Wallace,  O'Con- 
nell,  and  Goold,  who  instituted  a  sort  of  rivalry  in  uproar,  and 
played  against  each  other. 

With  such  a  judge,  and  such  auxiliaries  to  co-operate  with 
him,  some  idea  may  be  formed  of  the  attractions  which  were 
held  out  to  that  numerous  class  who  have  no  fixed  occupation, 
and  by  whom,  in  the  hope  of  laughing  hunger  away,  the  Four 
Courts  are  frequented  in  Dublin.  Long  before  Lord  Norbuiy 
took  his  seat,  the  galleries  were  densely  filled  with  faces 
strangely  expressive  of  idleness,  haggardness,  and  humor.  At 
about  eleven  his  Lordship's  registrar,  Mr.  Peter  Jackson,  used 
to  slide  in  with  an  official  leer ;  and  a  little  after  Lord  Norbuiy 
entered  with  a  grotesque  waddle,  and,  having  bowed  to  the 
Bar,  cast  his  eyes  round  the  court.  Perceiving  a  full  house,  an 
obvious  expression  of  satisfaction  pervaded  his  countenance ; 
and  if  he  saw  any  of  his  acquaintance  of  a  noble  family,  such  as 
John  Claudius  Beresford,  who  had  a  good  deal  of  time  on  his 
hands,  in  the  crowd,  he  ordered  the  tipstaff  to  make  way  for 
him,  and,  in  order,  I  presume,  to  acid  to  the  dignity  of  the  pro- 
ceedings, placed  him  beside  himself  on  the  bench. 

While  the  jury  were  swearing,  he  either  nodded  familiarly 
to  most  of  them,  occasionally  observing,  "  A  most  respectable 
man;"  or,  if  the  above-mentioned  celebrated  member  of  the 
house  of  Curraghmore*  chanced  to  be  next  him,  was  engaged 
in  so  pleasant  a  vein  of  whispering,  that  it  was  conjectured, 
from  the  heartiness  of  his  laugh,  that  he  must  have  been  talk- 
ing of  the  recreations  of  the  Riding-house,  and  the  amusements 
of  1798.f  The  junior  counsel  having  opened  the  pleadings, 
Lord  Norbury  generally  exclaimed,  "A  very  promising  young 
man!  Jackson,  what  is  that  young  gentleman's  name?" — 
"Mr. ,  my  Lord."— "What,  of  the  county   of  Cork  ?— I 

*  Curraghmore,  in  the  County  of  Waterford.  is  the  seat  of  the  Marquis  of 
Waterford,  head  of  the  Beresford  family. —  M. 

t  The  Riding-house  was  a  place  in  Dublin,  where  Beresford  used  to  have 
suspected  "  rebels  '  flogged,  with  cruelty,  to  torture  them  into  "loyalty."  —  M 


HENRY   DEANE   GKADY.  23 

knew  it  by  his  air.  Sir,  you  are  a  gentleman  of  very  high 
pretensions,  and  I  protest  that  I  have  never  heard  the  many 
counts  stated  in  a  more  dignified  manner  in  all  my  life :  I 
hope  I  shall  find  yon,  like  the  paper  before  me,  a  Daily  Free- 
man in  my  court."  Having  despatched  the  junior,  whom  he 
was  sure  to  make  the  luckless,  but  sometimes  not  inappropriate 
victim  of  his  encomiums,  he  suffered  the  leading  counsel  to 
proceed. 

As  he  was  considered  to  have  a  strong  bias  toward  the 
plaintiff,  experimental  attorneys  brought  into  the  Common 
Pleas  the  very  worst  and  most  discreditable  adventures  in 
litigation.  The  statement  of  the  case,  therefore,  generally 
disclosed  some  paltry  ground  of  action,  which,  however,  did 
not  prevent  his  Lordship  from  exclaiming  in  the  outset,  "A 
very  important  action  indeed  !  If  you  make  out  your  facts  in 
evidence,  Mr.  "Wallace,  there  will  be  serious  matter  for  the 
jury."  The  evidence  was  then  produced  ;  and  the  witnesses 
often  consisted  of  wretches  vomited  out  of  stews  and  cellars, 
whose  emaciated  and  discolored  countenances  showed  their 
want  and  their  depravity,  while  their  watchful  and  working 
eyes  intimated  that  mixture  of  sagacity  and  humor  by  which 
the  lower  order  of  Irish  attestators  is  distinguished.  They 
generally  appeared  in  coats  and  breeches,  the  external  decency 
of  which,  as  they  were  hired  for  the  occasion,  was  ludicrously 
contrasted  with  the  ragged  and  filthy  shirt,  which  Mr.  Henry 
Deane  Grady,  who  was  well  acquainted  with  "  the  inner  man" 
of  an  Irish  witness,  though  not  without  repeated  injunctions  to 
unbutton,  at  last  compelled  them  to  disclose. 

The  cross-examinations  of  this  gentleman  were  admirable 
pieces  of  the  most  serviceable  and  dexterous  extravagance. 
He  was  the  Scarron  of  the  Bar;  and  few  of  the  most  practised 
and  skilful  of  the  horde  of  perjurers  whom  he  was  employed 
to  encounter,  could  successfully  withstand  the  exceedingly 
droll  and  comical  scrutiny  through  which  he  forced  them  to 
pass.  He  had  a  sort  of  "  Hail  fellow,  well  met !"  mannemvith 
every  varlet,  which  enabled  him  to  get  into  his  heart  and  core, 
until  he  had  completely  turned  him  inside  out,  and  excited 
such  a  spirit  of  mirth,  that  the  knave  whom  he  was  uncovering. 


24 


LORD   NORBURY. 


could  not  help  joining  in  the  merriment  which  the  detection 
of  his  villany  had  produced. 

Lord  Norbury,  however,  when  he  saw  Mr.  Grady  pushing 
the  plaintiff  to  extremities,  used  to  come  to  his  aid,  and  rally 
the  broken  recollections  of  the  witness.  This  interposition 
called  the  defendant's  counsel  into  stronger  action,  and  they 
were  as  vigorously  encountered  by  the  counsel  on  the  other 
side.  Interruption  created  remonstrance  ;  remonstrance  called 
forth  retort;  retort  generated  sarcasm;  and  at  length  voices 
were  raised  so  loud,  and  the  blood  of  the  forensic  combatants 
was  so  warmed,  that  a  general  scene  of  confusion,  to  which 
Lord  Norbury  most  amply  contributed,  took  place. 

The  uproar  gradually  increased  till  it  became  tremendous ; 
and,  to  add  to  the  tumult,  a  question  of  law,  which  threw 
Lord  Norbury 's  faculties  into  complete  chaos,  was  thrown  into 
the  conflict.  Mr.  Grady  and  Mr.  O'Connell  shouted  upon  one 
side,  Mr.  Wallace  and  Mr.  Goold  upon  the  other,  and  at  last, 
Lord  Norbury,  the  witnesses,  the  counsel,  the  parties,  and  the 
audience,  were  involved  in  one  universal  riot,  in  which  it  was 
difficult  to  determine  whether  the  laughter  of  the  audience,  the 
exclamations  of  the  parties,  the  protestations  of  the  witnesses, 
the  cries  of  the  counsel,  or  the  bellowing  of  Lord  Norbury 
predominated.  At  length,  however,  his  Lordship's  superiority 
of  lungs  prevailed ;  and,  like  iEolus  in  his  cavern  (of  whom, 
with  his  puffed  cheeks  and  inflamed  visage,  he  would  furnish 
a  painter  with  a  model),  he  shouted  his  stormy  subjects  into 
peace.  These  scenes  repeatedly  occurred  during  the  trial, 
until  at  last  both  parties  had  closed,  and  a  new  exhibition  took 
place.  This  was  Lord  Norbury 's  monologue,  commonly  called 
a  charge. 

He  usually  began  by  pronouncing  the  loftiest  encomiums 
upon  the  party  in  the  action,  against  whom  he  intended  to 
advise  the  jury  to  give  their  verdict.  For  this  the  audience 
were  well  prepared  ;  and  accordingly,  after  he  had  stated  that 
the  defendant  was  one  of  the  most  honorable  men  alive,  and 
that  he  knew  his  father,  and  loved  him,  he  suddenly  came, 
with  a  most  singular  emphasis,  which  he  accompanied  with  a 
strange  shake  of  his  wig,  to  the  fatal  "but,"  which  made  the 


T()BY   M'CORMICK.  25 

audience,  who  were  in  expectation  of  it,  burst  into  a  fit  of 
laughter,  while  he  proceeded  to  charge,  as  he  almost  uniformly 
did,  in  the  plaintiff's  favor.  He  then  entered  more  deeply,  as 
he  said,  into  the  case,  and,  flinging  his  judicial  robe  half  aside, 
and  sometimes  casting  off  his  wig,  started  from  his  seat,  and 
threw  off  a  wild  harangue,  in  which  neither  law,  method,  noi 
argument,  could  be  discovered.  It  generally  consisted  of 
narratives  connected  with  the  history  of  his  early  life,  whiclt 
it  was  impossible  to  associate  with  the  subject  —  of  jests  from 
Joe  Miller,  mixed  with  jokes  of  his  own  manufacture,  and  of 
sarcastic  allusions  to  any  of  the  counsel  who  had  endeavored 
to  check  him  during  the  trial.  He  was  exceedingly  fond  of 
quotations  from  Milton  and  Shakspere,  which,  however  out 
of  place,  were  very  well  delivered,  and  evinced  an  excellent 
enunciation.  At  the  conclusion  of  his  charge,  he  made  some 
efforts  to  call  the  attention  of  the  jury  to  any  leading  incident 
which  particularly  struck  him,  but  what  he  meant  it  was  not 
very  easy  to  conjecture;,  and  when  he  sat  down,  the  whole 
performance  exhibited  a  mind  which  resembled  a  whirlpool  of 
mud,  in  which  law,  facts,  arguments,  and  evidence,  were  lost 
in  unfathomable  confusion. 

Some  years  ago,  I  remember,  at  the  close  of  his  charges  a 
ludicrous  incident,  which  was  a  kind  of  practical  commentary, 
sometimes  took  place.  A  poor  maniac,  well  known  about  the 
Hall,  whose  name  was  "Toby  M'Cormick,"  had  been  a  suitoi 
in  the  Common  Pleas,  and  had  lost  his  senses  in  consequence 
of  the  loss  of  his  cause.  He  regularly  used  to  attend  the  court 
to  which  he  was  attracted  by  an  odd  fantasy  :  —  Toby  had  got  it 
into  his  head  that  he  was  Lord  Norbury  himself,  having  merged 
all  consciousness  of  his  own  separate  being  in  the  strong  image 
of  his  Lordship  which  was  constantly  present  to  his  mind, 
while,  upon  the  other  hand,  he  took  Lord  Norbury  for  "  Toby 
M'Cormick;"  believing  that  they  had  made  a  swap  of  their 
personal  identities,  and  exchanged  their  existence.  This 
strange  madman,  at  the  end  of  Lord  Norbury's  charges,  used 
to  cry  out,  with  some  imitation  of  his  manner,  "Find  for  the 
plaintiff!"  and  though  not  intended  as  a  sarcasm  upon  his 
habits,  yet  it  was  so  just  a  satire  that  Lord  Norbury  was  half 

Vol.  II.— 2 


26  LORD  NOEBURY. 

displeased,  and,  turning  to  Peter  Jackson,  exclaimed,  "Jack- 
eon,  turn  Toby  M'Cormick  out  of  court !" 

I  feel  that,  in  the  portrait  which  I  have  endeavored  to  draw 
of  the  late  Chief-Justice  of  the  Irish  Common  Pleas  in  presi- 
ding at  the  Nisi-Prius  sittings,  I  have  not  at  all  come  up  to  my 
original.  But  to  describe  him  in  such  a  way  as  to  match  the 
reality,  would  be,  perhaps,  impossible.  To  conceive  what  he 
was,  and  his  stupendous  extravagances,  it  would  have  been 
necessary  to  see  the  "  dtjpwv  ay™"  and  have  witnessed  the  prodigy 
itself.  It  is  no  exaggeration  to  say,  that  as  the  wildest  farce 
upon  the  stage  never  raised  more  laughter  than  his  exhibitions 
from  the  bench,  neither  could  any  writer  of  dramatic  drolleries, 
who  should  undertake  to  draw  him,  embody  the  substantial 
absurdity  of  his  character  in  any  fictitious  representation.  He 
might  have  defied  O'Keeffe  himself;  for  although  his  law  was 
like  Lingo's  Latin,  yet  I  do  not  think  that  even  O'KeenVs 
genius  for  extravagance  could  have  done  Lord  Norbury  justice. 

In  his  capacity  of  Judge,  sitting  in  full  court,  with  his  three 
coadjutors  about  him,  he  was  almost  as  ludicrous  as  in  his 
more  tumultuous  office  of  jester  at  Nisi  Prius.*     I  remember 

*  A  few  of  Lord  Norbury's  jests,  which  are  not  in  general  currency,  may  be 
worth  mentioning  here. —  Sir  Philip  Crampton  (father  of  the  present  British 
Minister  at  Washington)  was  a  remarkably  fine-looking  man,  tall  in  stature, 
erect  in  carriage,  elegant  in  manner,  graceful  in  movement.  In  1824,  when 
George  IV.  visited 

"  The  emerald  set  in  the  ring  of  the  sea," 
Sir  Philip  was  Surgeon-General  of  Ireland,  which  high  position  he  retains.  At 
the  King's  Levee,  he  appeared  in  the  rich  military  uniform  of  Surgeon-General. 
The  monarch  was  immediately  struck  with  his  appearance,  and,  turning  round 
to  Lord  Norbury,  who  stood  by  his  side,  rubicund  and  burly,  asked,  "  Who  is 
this  very  handsome  officer?"  With  the  merry  twinkle  of  his  eyes  which 
always  accompanied  Norbury's  jokes,  he  answered,  "  May  it  please  your  Majes- 
ty, he  is  General  of  the  Lancers." — Lord  Norbury  was  in  Tippe:ary  taking 
what  he  used  to  call  his  health  ride.  One  of  the  county  gentlemen,  a  Mr.  Pep- 
per, joined  him,  but  this  deponent  saith  not  whether  he  was  mounted  on  "  The 
White  Horse  of  the  Peppers."  His  steed,  however,  was  handsome  and  spir- 
ited,  and  Norbury  (who  was  an  excellent  judge  —  of  horse-flesh)  paid  him  some 
compliments  on  the  animal.  "  Ha9  plenty  of  life  —  eh?"  Mr.  Pepper  an- 
swered, "  So  much,  that  he  threw  me  over  his  head,  the  othei  day." — "  Named 
him,  yet  ?"  Mr.  Pepper  said  that  he  had  not.  "  Why,  then,"  said  the  joker, 
'*  considering  who  you  are,  and  how  he  has  served  you,  suppose  you  call  him 


JtTDGE   MAYNE.  27 

when  the  court  presented,  in  his  person,  and  in  that  of  Judge 
Mayne,  a  most  amusing  and  laughable  contrast.  Never  was 
Rochefoucault's  maxim,  that  "  gravity  is  a  mystery  of  the  body 
to  hide  the  defects  of  the  mind,"  more  strongly  exemplified 
than  in  the  solemn  figure  which  sat  for  many  years  on  Lord 
Norbury's  left  hand,  in  his  administration  of  the  law.  By  the 
profound  stagnation  of  his  calm  and  imperturbable  visage, 
which  improved  on  Gratiano's  description  of  a  grave  man,  and 
not  more  in  stillness  than  in  color  resembled  "  a  standing 
pool;"  by  a  certain  shake  of  his  head,  which,  moving  with  the 
mechanical  oscillation  of  a  wooden  mandarin,  made  him  look 
like  the  image  of  Confucius  which  is  plastered  on  the  dome  of 
the  Four  Courts ;  by  his  long  and  measured  sentences,  which 
issued  in  tones  of  oracular  wisdom  from  his  dry  and  ashy  lips ; 

Pepper-caster." — Going  to  a  Levee  at  Dublin  Castle,  with  another  of  the  judg 
es,  they  slipped  when  ascending  the  stairs.  "  Oh,  my  Lord,"  said  Norbury, 
as  he  rubbed  the  broadest  part  of  his  person,  which  had  been  barked  by  the 
fall,  "  you  and  I  have  tried  many  cases  in  our  time,  but  the  hardest  case  of  all 
is  this  staircase" — In  1816,  when  Prince  Leopold,  who  was  only  a  Serene 
Highness  (as  only  the  son  of  a  King  can  be  addressed  as  Royal)  was  about 
marrying  the  Princess  Charlotte  of  Wales,  he  was  complimented  by  her  father, 
then  Prince  Regent  of  England,  with  the  title  of  "  Royal  Highness."  This 
was  spoken  of  before  Lord  Norbury,  who  remarked  that  "  Marriage  was  the 
true  way  of  making  a  man  lose  his  serenity." — A  quaker  named  Nott  opened  a 
large  shop,  exactly  opposite  that  of  Kinahan,  the  well-known  Dublin  grocer, 
advertised  his  tea  as  cheaper  and  better  than  .any  in  Ireland,  and  declared  that 
he  would  not  vend  any  sugar,  as  it  yielded  no  profit.  The  novelty  of  the  con- 
cern and  the  excellence  and  low  price  of  Nott's  tea  and  coffee  drew  many  cus- 
tomers to  him  and  diminished  the  sales  of  Kinahan,  his  vis-a-vis  neighbor. 
Lord  Norbury  Went  to  the  Quaker's,  bought  fourteen  pounds  of  tea  (on  which 
the  profit  was  large),  and  crossed  over  to  Kinahan's,  where  he  asked  for  a  sup- 
ply of  sugar,  on  which  the  profits  are  or  were  nominal.  While  Kinahan  was 
having  the  sugar  weighed,  Nott's  porter  entered  the  shop  with  the  large  parcel 
of  tea  for  Lord  Norbury.  "  Leave  it  there,  on  the  counter,"  said  my  Lord. 
Then,  turning  to  Kinahan  who  was  dismayed  at  seeing  one  of  his  oldest  and 
best  customers  a  purchaser  at  his  rival's,  Norbury  said,  "  I  suppose,  Mr.  Kina- 
han, that  you  sell  a  great  deal  of  sugar  — by  Nott  selling  tea." — Some  thirty- 
five  years  ago,  a  lusty  negro  wench,  who  was  called  "The  Hottentot  Venus," 
was  publicly  exhibited  in  Ireland,  on  account  of  the  remarkable  si?e  of  her 
"  Western  Settlements."  "  1  wonder,"  said  Bushe,  "  whether  she  really  was 
a  Queen  in  her  own  country  —  as  she  boasts."  Norbury  answered,  "  No  doubt ; 
an  ebony  ruler,  of  course," — M.f 


28  LORD   NORBURY. 

by  liis  slow  and  even  gait,  and  his  systematic  and  regulated 
gesture,  Judge  Mayne  had  contrived,  when  at  the  bar,  to 
impose  himself  as  a  great  lawyer  on  the  public.  When  he 
was  made  a  judge,  upon  the  day  on  which  he  for  the  first  time 
took  his  seat,  Mr  Keller,  one  of  his  contemporaries,  and  a 
bitter  wag,  came  into  court,  and  seeing  him  enthroned  in  his 
dignity,  with  his  scarlet  robes  about  him,  leaned  over  the  bar 
bench,  and,  after  musing  for  some  time,  while  he  stretched  out 
his  shrewd  sardonic  face,  muttered  to  himself,  "Well,  Mayne, 
there  you  are  ! — there  you  have  been  raised  by  your  gravity, 
while  my  levity  still  sinks  me  here." 

This  pragmatical  personage,  who  was  considered  deep, 
while  he  was  only  dark  and  muddy,  was  fixed,  as  if  for  the 
purposes  of  contrast,  beside  Lord  Norbury,  but  so  far  from 
diminishing  the  effect  of  his  judicial  drolleries,  the  vapid  mel- 
ancholy of  the  one  brought  the  vivacity  of  his  companion  into 
stronger  light.  In  truth,  the  solemnity  of  Judge  Mayne  was 
nearly  as  comical  as  Lord  Norbury's  humor;  and  when,  seeing 
a  man  enter  the  court  who  had  forgotten  to  uncover,  Judge 
Mayne  rose  and  said,  "  I  see  you  standing  there  like  a  wild 
beast,  with  your  hat  on," — the  pomp  of  utterance,  and  the 
measured  dignity  with  which  this  splendid  figure  in  Irish 
oratory  was  enunciated,  excited  nearly. as  much  merriment  as 
the  purposed  jokes  and  the  ostentatious  merriment  of  the  chief 
of  the  court. 

Nothing,  not  even  Lord  Norbury,  could  induce  his  brother 
judge  to  smile.  His  features  seemed  to  have  some  inherent 
and  natural  incompatibility  with  laughter,  which  the  Momus 
of  the  bench  could  not  remove.  While  peals  rang  upon  peals 
of  merriment,  and  men  were  obliged  to  hold  their  sides,  lest 
they  should  burst  with  excess  of  ridicule,  Judge  Mayne  stood 
silent,  starch,  and  composed,  and  never  allowed  his  muscles  of 
rusty  iron  to  give  way  in  any  unmeet  and  extra-judicial  relax- 
ation. This  union  of  the  Allegro  and  Penseroso  was  invalua- 
ble to  the  seekers  of  fun  in  the  Common  Pleas,  and  it  was 
with  regret  that  the  merry  public  were  informed  that  Judge 
Mayne  had  been  advised  by  his  physicians  to  retire  from  the 
bench   and   take  up   his   residence  in   France.      He  went,  I 


JUDGE   JOHNSON.  29 

understand,  to  Paris,  where  he  used  occasionally  to  walk,  in  the 
brilliant  afternoons  of  that  enchanting  climate,  in  the  garden 
of  the  Tuileries,  and,  Scott's  Quentin  Durward  being  then  in 
vogue,  Judge  Mayne  was  taken  for  the  spectre  of  Trois  Echelles 
The  place  of  Judge  Mayne  was  latterly  supplied  by  a  very 
able  man  and  an  excellent  lawyer,  Mr.  Justice  Johnson ;  and 
then  a  scene  of  a  different  character,  but  still  exceedingly  amu- 
sing, was  afforded.  Lord  Norbury  was  now  most  unhappily 
situated,  for  he  had  Judge  Fletcher  upon  one  hand  and  Judge 
Johnson  upon  the  other.  The  former  was  a  man  of  an  uncom- 
monly vigorous  and  brawny  mind,  with  a  rude  but  powerful 
grasp  of  thought,  and  with  considerable  acquirements,  both  in 
literature  and  in  his  profession.  He  was  destitute  of  all  ele- 
gance, either  mental  or  external,  but  made  up  for  the  deficiency 
by  the  massive  and  robust  character  of  his  understanding.  He 
had  been  a  devoted  Whig  at  the  bar,  and  hated  Lord  Norbury 
for  his  politics,  while  he  held  his  intellect  in  contempt.  Dis- 
simulation was  not  among  his  attributes;  and,  as  his  indifferent 
health  produced  a  great  infirmity  of  temper  (for  he  was  the 
converse  of  what  a  Frenchman  defines  as  a  happy  man,  and 
had  a  bad  stomach  and  a  good  heart),  he  was  at  no  pains  in 
concealing  his  disrelish  for  his  brother  on  the  bench.  Judge 
Johnson,  who  occupied  the  seat  on  Lord  Norbury  "s  left  hand, 
completed  his  misfortunes  in  juxtaposition.  There  is  nothing 
whatever  about  Judge  Johnson  to  be  laughed  at,  although  his 
bursts  of  temperament  may  sometimes  prevoke  a  smile;  but, 
in  adding  to  Lord  Norbury's  calamities,  he  augmented  the  di- 
versions of  the  court.  He  was  less  habitually  atrabilious 
than  Judge   Fletcher,*   whose   characteristic   was  moroseness 

*  In  the  rampant  times  of  "  Protestant  Ascendency  in  Church  and  State," 
when  the  government  policy  was  to  report  Ireland  in  a  state  of  insurrectionary 
feeling,  and  within  a  hair's-hreadth  of  actual  rebellions  (so  as  to  justify 
coercive  Acts  of  Parliament,  with  which  to  keep  the  people  quiet),  Judge 
Fletcher  gave  immense  offence  to  the  ruling  powers  by  his  charges  to  Grand 
Juries,  on  Circuit,  in  which  he  always  stated,  that  if  they  weiv  rightly  governed 
the  Irish  would  be  as  well  conducted  as  any  people  on  earth.  He  used  to  tell 
the  country-gentlemen,  too,  that  whenever  a  county,  or  a  disf/ict,  became  dis- 
turbed, the  great  probability  was  that  the  landlords'  oppressions  (though  middle- 
men) or  neglect  of  duty  caused  the  evil.  —  Mf 


30  LORD  NORBURY. 

rather  than  irritability,  but  he  had  an  honest  vehemence  and 
impetuosity  about  him,  which,  whenever  his  sense  of  propriety 
was  violated,  he  could  not  restrain. 

When  the  Chief-Justice,  who  was  thus  disastrously  placed, 
was  giving  judgment  (if  the  olla-podrida  which  he  served  up 
for  the  general  entertainment  can  be  so  called),  the  spectacle 
derived  from  the  aspect  of  his  brother-judges  furnished  a  vast 
accession  of  amusement.  Judge  Fletcher,  indignant  at  all  the 
absurdity  which  was  thrown  up  by  Lord  Norbury,  and  which 
bespattered  the  bench,  began  expressing  his  disgust  by  the 
character  of  bilious  severity  which  spread  over  his  countenance, 
of  which  the  main  characteristic  was  a  fierce  sourness  and  a 
scornful  discontent.  Judge  Johnson,  on  the  other  hand,  en- 
deavored to  conceal  his  anger,  and,  placing  his  elbows  on  the 
bench,  and  thrusting  his  clinched  hands  upon  his  mouth,  tried 
to  stifle  the  indignation,  with  which,  however,  it  was  obvious 
that  he  was  beginning  to  tumefy.  After  a  little  while,  a  growl 
was  heard  from  Judge  Fletcher,  while  Judge  Johnson  respond- 
ed with  a  groan.  But,  undeterred  by  any  such  gentle  admo- 
nition, their  incomparable  brother,  with  a  desperate  intrepidity, 
held  on  his  way. 

Judge  Fletcher  had  a  habit,  when  exceedingly  displeased, 
of  rocking  himself  in  his  seat;  and,  as  he  was  of  a  considera- 
ble bulk,  his  swinging,  which  was  known  to  be  an  intimation 
of  his  augmenting  anger,  was  familiar  to  the  bar.  As  Lord 
Norbury  advanced,  the  oscillations,  accompanied  with  a  deeper 
growling,  described  a  greater  segment  of  a  circle,  and  shook 
the  whole  bench  ;  Avhile  Judge  Johnson,  with  his  shaggy  brows, 
bent  and  contracted  over  his  face,  and  with  his  eyes  flashing 
with  passion,  used,  with  an  occasional  exclamation  of  mingled 
indignation  and  disgust,  to  turn  himself  violently  round.  Still, 
on  Lord  Norbury  went ;  until  at  length,  Judge  Fletcher,  by 
his  pendulous  vibrations,  came  into  actual  collision  with  him 
upon  one  side,  and  Judge  Johnson,  by  his  averted  shrug,  hit 
him  on  the  shoulder  upon  the  other;  when,  awakened  by  the 
simultaneous  shock,  his  Lordship  gave  a  start,  and,  looking 
round  the  bar,  who  were  roaring  with  laughter  at  the  whole 
proceeding,  discharged  two  or  three  puffs ;  and,  felicitating  his 


AS   A    POLITICIAN.  31 

brothers  on  their  urbanity  and  good  manners,  in  revenge  for 
their  contumelious  estimate  of  his  talents,  generally  called  on 
the  tipstaff  to  bring  him  a  judicial  convenience,  and,  turning  to 
the  wall  of  the  court,  retaliated  from  the  bench  for  the  asper- 
sions which  they  had  cast  upon  him.  From  one  of  these  two 
formidable  commentators  he  was  latterly  relieved,  and  although 
Judge  Johnson  remained  beside  him,  still,  in  the  absence  of 
Judge  Fletcher  as  an  auxiliary,  he  became  latterly  somewhat 
mitigated  ;  while  Judge  Moore,  during  the  Chief-Justice's  legal 
expositions,  did  no  more  than  intimate  his  feelings  by  a  look  of 
good-natured  commiseration ;  and  Judge  Torrens*  turned  a 
polite  and  fastidious  smile,  full  of  the  gracefulness  of  the  Horse- 
Guards,  upon  his  noble  and  learned  brother. 

Such  was  Lord  Norbury  as  a  Judge.  It  remains  to  say  a 
few  words  of  him  as  a  politician.  It  is  almost  unnecessary  to 
state  that,  with  such  intellectual  endowments,  he  did  not  coin- 
cide with  Grattan,  and  Curran,  and  Plunket,  and  Bushe,  in  the 
views  which  were  taken  by  those  inferior  persons  of  the  inter- 
est of  their  country,  but  that  be  agreed  in  principle  and  in  feel- 
ing with  Doctor  Duigenan,  Mr.  Dawson,  and  Sir  George  Hill,t 

*  James  Ton-ens,  senior  puisne  judge  of  the  Common  Pleas  in  Ireland,  is 
brother  to  the  late  Sir  Henry  Torrens,  who  accompanied  "The  Duke"  (then 
Sir  Arthur  Wellesley),  to  Portugal,  acted  as  his  Military  Secretary,  finally  (in 
1820)  became  an  Adjutant-General  of  the  British  army,  was  the  intimate  con- 
fidant of  the  Duke  of  York,  and  died  in  1828. —  This  relationship,  backed  by 
his  own  reputation  as  a  lawyer,  obtained  Mr.  Torrens'  advancement  to  the 
bench. —  M. 

t  Sir  George  Hill  and  Mr.  George  Robert  Dawson  were  the  Protestant 
Ascendency  members  for  the  city  of  Londonderry.  The  name  of  the  former 
will  be  recollected,  not  for  any  merits  of  him  who  bore  it,  but  in  connection 
with  the  arrest  of  Tone.  In  September,  1798,  Tone,  then  holding  a  military 
commission  under  the  French  Directory,  went  to  make  a  descent  upon  Ireland, 
with  three  thousand  men,  and  a  small  naval  force  under  Admiral  Bompert. 
The  expedition  was  met  by  a  British  squadron  under  Admiral  Warren.  A  bat- 
tlo  ensued,  and,  after  a  gallant  combat  of  six  hours'  duration,  the  French  were 
defeated.  Tone,  who  had  commanded  a  battery  on  board  the  Admiral's  ship,  was 
among  the  captured  officers.  He  was  not  recognised  —  perhaps  some  who  knew 
him  generously  avoided  doing  so.  It  was  suspected  that  he  was  of  the  party. 
Sir  George  Hill,  his  fellow-student  at  Trinity  college,  volunteered  to  identify 
him.  While  the  prisoners  were  breakfasting  with  the  Earl  of  Cavan,  tbey 
were  disturbed  by  Hill  and  a  party  of  police-officers.     Stepping  up  to  Tone,  he 


32  LORD  NORBURY. 

and  the  rest  of  the  illustrious  statesmen  by  whom  the  cause  of 
Ascendency  has  been  so  firmly  and  so  appropriately  supported. 
Lord  Norbury  was  an  excellent  and  uniform  Protestant.  This 
was  always  well  known  in  Ireland,  but,  his  buffoonery  having 
swollen  up  and  concealed  the  other  traits  of  his  character,  little 
notice  was  taken  of  his  personal  predilections. 

It  was,  indeed,  his  habit  to  deliver  orations  to  the  grand- 
jury  upon  the  church  and  state  in  the  home  circuit ;  and  in 
reference  to  I.  K.  L.*  he  often  poured  out  a  tirade  against 
"  Moll  Doyle,"  one  of  the  wild  personifications  of  agrarian  in- 
surrection in  the  south  of  Ireland  ;  but,  however  indecorous 
these  allusions  were  deemed  in  a  Chief- Justice,  the  people 
were  so  much  accustomed  to  laugh  at  his  Lordship,  that  even 
where  there  was  good  cause  for  remonstrance,  they  could  not 
be  prevailed  on  to  regard  anything  he  did  in  a  serious  way. 
As  carte  blanclie  is  given  to  Grimaldi,f  the  public  allowed  Lord 
Norbury  an  unlimited  license  ;  and  in  law,  politics,  and  religion, 
never  placed  any  restraint  upon  him.     At  length,  however,  an 

said,  "  Mr.  Tone,  I  am  very  happy  to  see  you."  With  much  composure  Tone 
replied  that  he  was  happy  to  see  Sir  George,  and  politely  inquired  after  Lady 
Hill.  Tone  was  taken  into  another  room,  ironed,  sent  off  to  Dublin,  tried  by 
court-martial,  and  sentenced  to  death,  which  he  anticipated  by  suicide. — 
George  Robert  Dawson,  married  to  Sir  Robert  Peel's  sister,  held  office  under 
the  Duke  of  Wellington's  Administration,  and  had  long  been  a  decided  oppo- 
nent of  the  Catholic  Claims.  In  1828,  at  a  Corporation  dinner,  in  London- 
derry, he  ventured  to  hint  that  it  might  be  better  to  settle  the  Catholic  ques- 
tion, by  fair  concession,  than  hazard  civil  war  by  continuing  to  oppose  it.  This, 
at  such  a  meeting,  was  received  with  groans  and  hisses.  The  Orange  press 
denounced  Dawson  as  a  traitor  — but  more  rational  politicians  felt  that  a  Gov- 
ernment official  would  never  have  uttered  such  words,  except  with  some  knowl- 
edge of  a  coming  change  of  measures,  and  this  was  confirmed  by  Dawson's 
continuing  in  office.  It  was  seen  that  something  was  in  agitation,  and  that 
Dawson's  speech  was  a  feeler.  A  few  months  after  this,  Catholic  Emancipation 
was  granted. —  Mr.  Dawson,  who  is  an  excellent  man  of  business,  uniting  talent 
with  industry,  and  conscientious  principle  with  both,  is  now  Deputy-Chairman 
of  the  Commissioners  of  Customs,  in  England. —  M. 

*  The  late  Dr.  Doyle,  Catholic  Bishop  of  Kildare  and  Leighlin. —  M. 

t  Joseph  Grimaldi,  born  in  1779,  and  deceased  in  1837,  was  noted  and  pop- 
pular,  in  London,  for  forty  years,  as  an  unrivalled  pantomimic  clown  at  the 
theatres.  His  biographer  speaks  of  a  "  rich  and  (paradoxical  as  the  term  may 
seem)  intellectual  buffoonery,  peculiarly  his  own  —  portraying  to  the  life  all  that. 
IS  giotesque  in  manners,  or  droll  in  action,"— M. 


mr.  sauein's  letter.  33 

event  occurred  which  awakened  the  general  notice;  and,  as 
there  was  another  and  a  very  obnoxious  individual  concerned, 
excited  among  the  Roman  Catholics  universal  indignation. 

Lord  Norbury  has  been  always  remarkable  for  his  frugality. 
He  was  in  the  habit  of  stuffing  papers  into  the  old  chairs  in  his 
study,  in  order  to  supply  the  deficiency  of  horse-hair  which  the 
incumbency  of  eighty  years  had  produced  in  their  bottoms. 
At  last,  however,  they  became,  even  with  the  aid  of  this  occa- 
sional supplement,  unfit  for  use,  and  were  sent  by  his  Lordship 
to  a  shop  in  which  old  furniture  was  advertised  to  be  bought 
and  sold.  An  individual  of  the  name  of  Monaghan  got  one 
of  these  chairs  into  his  possession,  and,  finding  it  stuffed  with 
papers,  drew  them  out.  He  had  been  a  clerk  in  an  attorney's 
office,  and  knew  Mr.  Saurin's  handwriting.  He  perceived,  by 
the  superscription  of  a  letter,  that  it  was  written  by  the  Attor- 
ney-General, and  on  opening  it  he  found  the  following  words 
addressed  to  a  Chief- Justice,  and  a  going  Judge  of  assize,  by 
the  principal  law-officer  of  the  Crown  : — 

"  Dublin  Castle,  August  9. 
"  I  transcribe  for  you  a  very  sensible  part  of  Loi-d  Ross's*  letter  to  me.     '  As, 
Lord  Norbury  goes  our  circuit,  and  as  he  is  personally  acquainted  with  the 

*  Lord  Ross,  who  advises  Mr.  Saurin  to  adopt  the  course  which  he  so  faith- 
fully pursued,  was  once  Sir  Laurence  Parsons,  and  was  in  the  habit  of  speaking 
in  the  Irish   House  of  Commons  in  favor  of  emancipation.     He  was  not  only 
an  orator,  but  a  poet.     In  the  appendix  to  the  first  volume  of  "  Wolfe  Tone's 
Memoirs,"  a  poem  is  inserted,  which  would  have  entitled  him  to  the  place  of 
Laureate  to  the  United  Irishmen.     The  following  are  the  opening  lines  : — 
"  How  long,  O  Slavery !  shall  thine  iron  mace 
Wave  o'er  this  isle,  and  crouch  its  abject  race  ? 
Full  many  a  dastard  century  werve  bent 
Beneath  thy  terrors,  wretched  and  content. 
"  What  though  with  haughty  arrogance  of  pride 
England  shall  o'er  this  long-duped  country  stride, 
And  lay  on  stripe  on  stripe,  and  shame  on  shame, 
And  brand  to  all  eternity  its  name : 
11  'Tis  right,  well  done,  bear  all  and  more,  I  say, 
Nay,  ten  times  more,  and  then  for  more  still  pray ! 
What  state  in  something  would  not  foremost  be? 
She  strives  for  fame,  thou  for  servility." 
[The  present  Earl    of  Rosse,  born   in    1800,  confers  a  lustre   on   the   title  far 
greater  than  what  he  derives  from  it.     His  successful  devotion  to  the  physical 

9* 


3i  LORD    NOKBURY. 

gentlemen  of  our  county,  a  hint  to  him  may  be  of  use.  He  is  in  the  habit  of 
talking  individually  to  them  in  his  chamber  at  Phillipstown ;  and  if  he  were  to 
impress  on  them  the  consequence  of  the  measure,  viz.,  that  however  they  may 
think  otherwise,  the  Catholics  would,  in  spite  of  them,  elect  Catholic  members 
(if  such  were  eligib.e),  that  the  Catholic  members  would  then  have  the  nomi- 
nation of  sheriffs,  and  in  many  instan  ''S,  perhaps  of  the  judges ;  and  the  Protes- 
tants would  be  put  in  the  back-gr,  and,  as  the  Protestants  were  formerly ;  I 
think  he  would  bring  the  effect  of  the  measure  home  to  themselves,  and  satisfy 
them  that  they  could  scarcely  submit  to  live  in  the  country  if  it  were  passed.' 
So  far  Lord  Ross.  But  what  he  suggests  in  another  part  of  his  letter,  that  '  if 
Pi'otestant  gentlemen,  who  have  votes  and  influence  and  interest,  would  give 
these  venal  members  to  understand  that  if  they  will  purchase  Catholic  votes  by 
betraying  their  country  and  its  constitution,  they  shall  infallibly  lose  theirs ;  it 
would  alter  their  conduct,  though  it  could  neither  make  them  honest  or  respect- 
able. If  you  will  judiciously  administer  [•'•']  a  little  of  this  medicine  to  the 
King's  County,  and  other  members  of  Parliament,  that  may  fall  in  your  way, 
you  will  deserve  well.  Many  thanks  for  your  letter,  and  its  good  intelligence 
from  Maryborough.  Jebb  is  a  most  valuable  fellow,  and  of  the  sort  that  is 
most  wanted.'  "Affectionately  and  truly  yours, 

"  William  Saurin." 

When  this  letter  was  first  disclosed,  it  was  vehemently  as 
serted  by  Mr.  Sanrin's  friends,  that  a  man  of  his  fame  and 
constitutional  principles  could  not  have  written  it,  and  they 
alleged  that  it  was  a  mere  fabrication  ;  but  afterward,  when 
the  handwriting  was  perceived  to  be  indisputable,  and  the 
author  of  the  letter  did  not  dare  to  deny  its  authenticity,  Mr. 
Peel,  and  the  other  advocates  of  Mr.  Saurin,  contented  them- 
selves with  exclaiming  against  the  mere  impropriety  of  its  pro- 
duction. From  this  ground  of  imputation  they  were,  however, 
effectually  driven  by  Mr.  Brougham,t  when  he  called  to  the 
Minister's  recollection,  and  especially  to  that  of  the  Secretary 
of  the  Home  Department,  whom  it  chiefly  concerned,  the  foul 

sciences,  especially  to  optics  and  astronomy,  has  given  him  high  place  among 
the  knowledge-seekers  of  the  age.  In  1849,  Lord  Rosse  was  elected  President 
of  the  Royal  Society  of  England. —  M. 

t  Mr.  Brougham  laid  a  trap  for  Mr.  Peel.  The  writer  of  this  article  was 
told,  upon  good  authority,  that  he  introduced  Mr.  Saurin 's  letter  into  the  de- 
bate, in  ordnr  to  allure  Mr.  Peel  into  a  censure  of  the  use  which  had  been 
made  of  it.  The  latter  fell  into  the  snare,  and  the  moment  he  began  to  inveigh 
against  the  production  of  the  letter,  Mr.  Brougham,  who  had  been  intently 
and  impatiently  watching  him,  slapped  his  knee,  and  cried,  "  I  have  him  !" 


QtJEES  Caroline's  trial.  85 

means  adopted  to  get  at  evidence  against  the  Queen.*  Since 
that  time  we  have  heard  no  more  of  the  violation  of  all  good 
feeling  in  the  Catholics,  when  they  availed  themselves  of  a 
document  in  the  handwriting  of  an  Attorney-General,  in  order 
to  establish  the  fact  which  had  been  frequently  insisted  on, 
that  poison  had  been  poured  into  the  highest  sources  of  jus- 
tice. 

The  moral  indignation  of  Protestants  has  subsided,  but  they 
have  not  recovered  from  their  astonishment,  that  a  man  so 
cautious  and  deliberate  as  William  Saurin,  should  have  put 
himself  in  the  power  of  such  a  person  as  Lord  Norbury,  and 
intrusted  him  with  a  communication,  which  has  eventually 
proved  so  fatal  to  himself.  He  must  have  known  the  habits 
of  the  man,  and  it  is  difficult  to  conceive  how  he  could  look 
upon  the  alliance  of  so  singular  an  individual  as  of  importance 
to  his  party,  or  regard  him  as  likely  to  produce  any  impression 
upon  the  grand  juries  to  which  his  loyal  exhortations  were  to 
be  addressed. 

The  discovery  of  this  letter  has  been  of  great  prejudice  to 
Mr.  Saurin,  as  it  renders  it  impossible  to  promote  him,  with 
any  sort  of  decency,  after  such  a  proceeding;  but  it  was  of 
use  to  Lord  Norbury.  When  his  incompetence  in  his  office 
was  mentioned  in  Parliament,  the  Orange  faction  considered 

*  The  manner  which  the  evidence  against  Queen  Caroline,  consort  of  George 
IV.,  was  got  up  by  the  British  Government  was  illegal.  The  scale  of  pay- 
ment was  in  a  manner  regulated  by  the  extent  of  the  evidence  given  !  The 
more  damning  the  testimony,  the  greater  the  reward. —  There  always  has  been 
a  popular  belief  in  England  (though  the  fact  was  denied,  as  if  on  authority,  by 
Fox,  in  Parliament),  that  George  IV.  was  married,-  previous  to  his  union  with 
Caroline  of  Brunswick,  to  Mrs.  Fitzherbert  —  the  lady  described  as  "fat,  fair, 
and  forty,"  when  he  first  met  her.  It  was  on  this  marriage,  and  the  subsequent 
royal  repudiation  of  the  lady,  that  Moore  wrote  the  Irish  Melody,  "  When  first 
I  met  thee,  warm  and  young,"  which  Byron  was  fond  of  chanting,  in  his  soli 
tary  hours  at  Venice,  where  (to  use  his  own  words)  "  like  a  hunted  stag,  he 
had  taken  to  the  waters,  and  there  stood  at  bay." — Queen  Caroline  had  her 
joke  on  the  liaison  or  marriage  (whichever  it  might  be)  with  Mrs.  Fitzherbert, 
and  said,  in  1820,  "I  never  was  guilty  of  adultery  but  once  —  and  that  was  with 
Mrs.  Fitzherbert's  husband  !"  Another  of  her  hits  was  her  saying,  when  asked, 
on  her  return  to  England,  where  she  intended  to  stop  in  London,  "  I  think  I 
sna.i  take  a  chop  at  the  King's  Heady — M. 


36  LOUD   NORBURY. 

themselves  bound  by  that  principle  of  fidelity  to  each  other, 
by  which,  to  do  them  justice,  they  are  characterized  to  sup- 
port a  very  zealous,  if  not  a  very  respectable  partisan  ;  and 
accordingly  Mr.  Goulburn,  with  the  effrontery  which  distin- 
guishes him,  pronounced  a  panegyric  upon  his  judicial  excel- 
lences, and  stated  (to  the  great  and  just  indignation  of  the 
other  judges  of  the  Common  Pleas)  that  in  a  difficult  and  com- 
plicated case  he  had  evinced  more  knowledge  and  astuteness 
than  any  of  them.  To  this  encomium,  Mr.  Peel,  with  all  his 
manliness,  and  although  he  values  himself  on  his  reformation 
of  the  abuses  of  justice,  gave  his  sanction.  Lord  Norbury, 
finding  himself  sustained  by  his  party  in  the  House  of  Com- 
mons, turned  a  deaf  ear  to  all  private  solicitations,  of  which 
his  resignation  was  the  object.* 

At  length  Mr.  O'Connell  presented  a  petition  for  his  removal, 
setting  forth,  among  other  grounds,  that  he  had  fallen  asleep 
during  the  trial  of  a  murder  case,  and  was  unable  to  give  any 
account  of  the  evidence,  when  called  on  for  his  notes  by  the 
Lord   Lieutenant.     Mr.  Scarlett,t  to  whom   the   petition  was 

*  When  it  was  determined  to  give  Lord  Norbury  a  hint  that  it  was  time  to 
retire,  the  task  —  which  was  one  of  delicacy,  if  not  of  peril  —  was  confided 
to  William  Gregory,  then  under-secretaiy  for  Ireland.  Norbury  got  scent  of 
the  object  of  his  visit,  and,  the  moment  he  appeared,  locked  the  door,  with  a 
confidential  and  grave  air,  and  said,  "  You  are  one  of  my  best  and  oldest  friends. 
I  was  just  writing  for  you  to  come  here,  when  I  heard  your  voice.  I  am  told 
that  I  am  to  be  insulted  —  that  they  mean  to  ask  me  to  resign.  The  mock- 
monarch  in  Phoenix  Park  is  irresponsible,  but  the  hack  that  he  sends  shall  be 
his  proxy.  I'll  have  his  life,  or  he'll  have  mine  —  ay,  if  he  were  my  brother 
My  old  friend  Gregory,  you  will  stand  by  me  ?  Here  are  the  hair-triggers." 
Here  he  opened  his  pistol-case.  "  Here  they  are,  as  ready  now  as  when  they 
blazed  at  Fitzgerald,  and  almost  frightened  Napper  Tandy  out  of  his  skin.  Stay 
and  dine  with  me,  and  we'll  talk  it  over." — Peaceable  Mr.  Gregory  declined 
the  invitation,  but  did  not  perform  his  mission.  That,  however,  was  done  by 
letter  from  Peel,  who  was  then  Home  Secretary.  The  rest  of  the  story,  as  to 
the  forced  resignation,  is  exactly  as  Mr.  Sheil  tells  it.  Norbury  made  good 
terms  —  two  steps  in  the  peerage  (he  was  raised  from  the  dignity  of  Baron  to 
that  of  Viscount  and  Earl),  and  a  pension  of  four  thousand  pounds  a  year. —  M. 

t  James  Scarlett,  afterward  Lord  Abinger,  was  more  distinguished  as  an  ad- 
vocate than  a  judge.  Born  in  Jamaica,  in  1769  (his  brother  was  Chief-Justice 
of  the  island),  Mr.  Scarlett  was  called  to  the  English  Bar,  in  .1791,  closely 
and  patiently  studied  the  law  (chiefly  making  himself  acquainted  with  the  mod* 


iJtS    ENFORCED    RESIGNATION.  3? 

intrusted,  did  not  move  upon  it,  in  consequence  of  a  personal 
assurance  from  Mr.  Peel,  that  he  would  do  everything  in  his 
power  to  induce  him,  of  his  own  accord,  to  retire.  For  although 
Mr.  Peel  ostensibly  defended  him  as  a  friend  and  partisan, 
yet  he  was,  in  reality,  ashamed  of  such  an  incubus  upon  the 
bench.  Lord  Norbury  at  last  went  so  far  as  to  intimate  that 
he  would  consult  his  friends  on  the  subject,  and  required  a 
reasonable  time  to  do  so,  which  was  accordingly  granted. 
After  the  lapse  of  a  month,  Mr.  Goulburn  called  again  to  know 
the  result  of  his  deliberations,  when  his  lordship  stated  that 
Lord  Combermere  was  his  most  particular  friend,  and  that  he 
had  written  to  him  at  Calcutta.  Mr.  Goulburn,  finding  himself 
thus  evaded,  and  being  conscious  that  he  was  as  well  qualified 
at  eighty-six  as  he  had  ever  been  (for  no  increased  hallucina- 
tion is  perceptible  about  him),  was  a  good  deal  at  a  loss  what 
to  do.  But  suddenly  Mr.  Canning  became  lord  of  the  ascen- 
dant ;  and  Lord  "Norbury,  who  never  wanted  sagacity,  feeling 
that  under  the  new  system  he  could  not  expect  the  support  of 
ministers,  wisely  came  into  terms ;  and  having  stipulated  for 
an  earldom,  as  a  consideration,  resigned  in  favor  of  Lord  Plun- 

ern  reports),  chose  the  northern  circuit,  and  became  distinguished,  almost  from 
starting,  for  his  knowledge  of  law  and  his  dexterous  examination  of  witnesses. 
In  1816,  he  was  made  King's  Counsel,  and  entered  Parliament,  as  a  Whig,  in 
1818.  He  was  not  a  good  debater  and  did  not  shine  as  a  senator.  His  votes 
were  on  the  liberal  side,  and  he  supported  the  attempts  of  Romilly  and  Macin 
tosh  to  ameliorate  the  Draconian  severity  of  the  criminal  code.  Under  Can- 
ning's administration,  in  1827,  Mr.  Scarlett  was  made  Solicitor-General  and 
knighted.  He  retained  office  under  the  Wellington  Cabinet  —  changing  his 
political  opinions,  much  to  the  damage  of  his  populai^ity.  When  Catholic 
Emancipation  was  granted,  in  1829,  he  succeeded  to  the  office  of  Attorney- 
General,  vacated  by  Sir  Charles  Wetherell,  who  was  hostile  to  the  measure, 
and  earned  additional  unpopularity  by  a  crusade  against,  the  press.  For  this, 
he  was  introduced  into  Bulwer's  Paul  Clifford,  as  "  Scarlett  Jem,  good  at  a 
press."  When  his  old  Mends,  the  Whigs,  came  into  office  in  1830,  they  cash- 
iered their  quondam  ally.  But,  in  1834,  under  Peel's  premiership,  Sir  James 
Scarlett  was  made  Chief-Baron  of  the  Exchequer,  and  raised  to  the  peerage. 
Latterly,  ill  health  made  his  temper  irri table.  He  had  to  preside,  in  1841,  at 
the  trial  of  certain  Chartists  charged  with  sedition,  and  exhibited  such  an  angrv 
partisan  feeling  against  them  as  to  cause  much  public  disapprobation,  and  some 
parliamentary  censure.     He  died,  in  1844,  in  his  seventy-fifth  year. —  M. 


38  LOftD  NORBtTRr. 

ket,  who,  like  an  unskilful  aeronaut,  lias  made  a  bad  descent 
into  the  Common  Pleas  * 

Thus  had  this  man,  without  talent,  or  knowledge  or  any- 
thing to  recommend  him,  beyond  his  personal  and  animal 
spirit,  to  the  favor  of  government,  raised  himself  to  a  high 
station  on  the  bench,  which  he  enjoyed  for  seven-and-twenty 
years ;  and  now,  laden  with  wealth,  effects  his  retreat  through  a 
loftier  grade  in  the  peerage.  He  has  accumulated  an  immense 
fortune,  partly  from  the  lucrative  offices  of  which  he  was  so 
long  in  the  enjoyment,  and  partly  through  his  rigid  economy. 
I  ought  not,  however,  to  omit  that,  parsimonious  as  his  habits 
are,  still  they  do  not  prevent  him  from  exercising  the  best  kind 
of  charity,  for  he  is  an  excellent  landlord.  In  his  dealings 
with  his  inferiors,  too  (I  gladly  avail  myself  of  the  opportunity 
of  bestowing  on  him  such  praise  as  he  deserves),  he  is  kind 
and  considerate;  and  toward  his  domestics  is  a  gentle  and 
forbearing  master.  In  his  deportment  to  the  Bar,  too,  he  was 
undeviatingly  polite,  and  never  forgot  that  he  was  himself  a 
member  of  the  profession,  on  which  the  recollection  of  every 
judge  should  forbid  him  to  trample.  In  private  society,  he  is 
a  most  agreeable,  although  a  very  grotesque  companion. 

He   is  not  wholly  destitute  of  literature ;    having  a  great 

*  John  Toler,  who  died  Earl  and  Baron  Norbury  and  Viscount  Glandine 
(having  also  obtained  a  distinct  peerage  for  his  wife),  was  born  in  1745,  and 
was  the  son  of  a  country  gentleman  in  Tipperary.  He  was  called  to  the  Irish 
bar  in  1770 ;  entered  Parliament  in  1776  ;  obtained  a  silk  gown  in  1781 ;  was 
made  Solicitor-General  in  1789  ;  succeeded  Wolfe  as  Attorney-General,  in  1798, 
was  made  Chief-Justice  of  the  Common  Pleas  in  1800,  being  created  Baron 
Norbnry;  retired  in  1827,  bargaining  for  two  steps  in  the  peerage,  and  a  pen- 
sion of  four  thousand  pounds  sterling  a  year;  and  died  in  July,  1831,  aged 
eighty-six.  Peihaps  no  one  ever  wore  the  emiine  so  wholly  unqualified  for  its 
dignity  and  responsibility,  as  Lord  Norbury.  So  cruel,  that  he  was  called  "  the 
hanging  judge  ;"  so  indecorous,  that  he  would  jest,  even  at  the  expense  of  the 
wretch  he  was  dooming  to  the  gallows  ;  so  callous,  that  public  reprobation  never 
galled  him ;  so  partial,  that  power,  however  unjust,  might  count  upon  his 
assistance ;  so  bad  a  lawyer,  that  the  merest  tyro  in  the  profession  had  often  to 
9et  him  right.  Truly  was  it  said,  when  he  died,  "  Mercy  droops  not  beside 
his  tomb  ;  nor  will  justice,  eloquence,  or  learning,  stretch  themselves  within  it." 
In  a  word,  among  bad  men,  at  a  time  when  oppression  and  injustice  prevailed, 
one  of  the  very  worst  was  thi    wicked  judge,  Lord  Norbury. —  M. 


HIS   LTBRAEt.  39 

metnory,  lie  is  fond  of  repeating  passages  from  the  older  poets, 
which  he  recites  with  propriety  and  force.  Of  modern  authors 
he  is  wholly  ignorant,  nor  is  a  new  book  to  be  found  in  his 
library.  His  study  presents,  indeed,  a  curious  spectacle.  In 
the  centre  of  the  room  lies  a  heap  of  old  papers,  covered  with 
dust,  mingled  with  political  pamphlets,  written  some  forty 
years  ago,  together  with  an  odd  volume  of  the  "Irish  Parlia- 
mentary Debates,"  recording  the  speeches  of  Mr.  Sergeant 
Toler.  On  the  shelves,  which  are  half  empty,  and  exhibit  a 
most  "beggarly  account,"  there  are  some  forty  moth-eaten  law- 
books ;  and  by  their  side  appear  odd  volumes  of  "  Peregrine 
Pickle,"  and  "Roderick  Random,"  with  the  "Newgate  Calen- 
dar," complete.  A  couple  of  wornout  saddles,  with  rusty  stir- 
rups, hang  from  the  top  of  one  of  the  bookcases,  which  are 
enveloped  with  cobwebs ;  and  a  long  line  of  veteran  boots 
of  mouldy  leather  are  arrayed  on  the  opposite  side  of  the 
room.  King  William's  picture  stands  over  the  chimney-piece,- 
with  prints  of  Eclipse  and  other  celebrated  racers,  from  which 
his  lordship's  politics,  and  other  predilections,  may  be  col- 
lected. 

He  was  a  remarkably  good  horseman,  and  even  now  always 
appears  well  mounted  in  the  streets.  A  servant,  dressed  in 
an  ancient  livery,  rides  close  beside  him  ;  and  by  his  very 
proximity  and  care,  assists  a  certain  association  with  loneli- 
ness which  has  begun  to  attend  him.  He  has,  in  truth,  assumed, 
of  late  a  very  dreary  and  desolate  aspect.  When  he  rode 
to  court,  as  he  did  every  day  while  a  judge,  he  exhibited,  for 
his  time  of  life,  great  alacrity  and  spirit;  and  as  he  passed  by 
Mr.  Joy,  whom  he  looked  upon  as  his  probable  successor,  put- 
ting spurs  to  his  horse,  he  cantered  rapidly  along.  But  now 
he  is  without  occupation  or  pursuit,  and  looks  alone  in  the 
world.  His  gayety  is  gone,  and  when  he  stops  an  old  ac- 
quaintance in  the  street  to  inquire  how  the  world  wags,  his 
voice  and  manner  exhibit  a  certain  wandering  and  oblivion, 
while  his  face  seems  at  once  dull,  melancholy,  and  abstracted. 

Sometimes  he  rides  beyond  Dublin,  and  is  to  be  met  in 
lonely  and  unfrequented  roads,  looking  as  if  he  was  musing 
over  mournful  recollections,  or  approaching  to  a  suspension  of 


40  LORD   NORBTTRiT. 

all  th ought.  Not  many  days  ago,  on  my  return  to  town  from 
a  short  excursion  in  the  country,  as  the  evening  drew  on,  I 
saw  him  riding  near  a  cemetery,  while  the  chill  breezes  of 
October  were  beginning  to  grow  bitter,  and  the  leaves  were 
falling  rapidly  from  the  old  and  withered  trees  in  the  adjoin- 
ing churchyard.  The  wind  had  an  additional  bleakness  as  it 
blew  over  the  residences  of  the  dead  ;  and  although  it  im- 
parted to  his  red  and  manly  cheeks  a  stronger  flush,  still,  as  it 
stirred  his  gray  locks,  it  seemed  with  its  wintry  murmurs  to 
whisper  to  the  old  man  a  funeral  admonition.  He  appeared, 
as  he  urged  on  his  horse  and  tried  to  hurry  from  so  dismal  a 
scene,  to  shrink  and  huddle  himself  from  the  blast.  In  anti- 
cipation of  an  event,  which  can  not  be  remote  (while  I  forgot 
all  his  political  errors,  and  only  remembered  how  often  he  had 
beguiled  a  tedious  hour,  and  set  the  Four  Courts  in  a  roar),  I 
could  not  help  muttering,  as  I  passed  him,  with  some  feeling 
of  regret,  "  Alas,  poor  Yorick  I" 


CLONMEL   ASSIZES. 

The  delineation  of  the  leading  members  of  the  Irish  bar  is 
not  the  only  object 'of  these  sketches.  It  is  my  purpose  to 
describe  the  striking  scenes,  and  to  record  the  remarkable  in- 
cidents, which  fall  within  my  own  forensic  observation.  That 
these  incidents  and  scenes  should  take  place  in  our  courts  of 
justice,  affords  a  sufficient  justification  for  making  the  "  Sketches 
of  the  Irish  Bar"  the  medium  of  their  narration.  I  might  also 
suggest  that  the  character  of  the  bar  itself  is  more  or  less  influ- 
enced by  the  nature  of  the  business  in  which  it  is  engaged. 
The  mind  of  any  man  who  habitually  attends  the  assizes  of 
Clonmel  carries  deep,  and  not  perhaps  the  most  useful,  impres- 
sions away  from  it.  How  often  have  I  reproached  myself  with 
having  joined  in  the  boisterous  merriment  which  either  the 
jests  of  counsel  or  the  droll  perjuries  of  the  witnesses  have 
produced  during  the  trial  of  a  capital  offence !  How  often 
have  I  seen  the  bench,  the  jury,  the  bar,  and  the  galleries,  of 
an  Irish  court  of  justice,  in  a  roar  of  tumultuous  laughter,  while 
I  beheld  in  the  dock  the  wild  and  haggard  face  of  a  wretch 
who,  placed  on  the  verge  of  eternity,  seemed  to  be  surveying 
the  gulf  on  the  brink  of  which  he  stood,  and  presented,  in  his 
ghastly  aspect  and  motionless  demeanor,  a  reproof  of  the  spirit 
of  hilarity  with  which  he  was  to  be  sent  before  his  God  ! 

It  is  not  that  there  is  any  kind  of  cruelty  intermixed  with 
this  tendency  to  mirth  ;  but  that  the  perpetual  recurrence  of 
incidents  of  the  most  awful  character  divests  them  of  the  power 
of  producing  effect,  and  that  they — 

"  Whose  fell  of  hair 
Would  at  a  dismal  treatise  rouse  and  stir 
As  life  were  iu't"  — 


4%  CLONMEL   ASSIZER. 

acquire  such  a  familiarity  with  direness,  that  they  become  not 
only  insensible  to  the  dreadful  nature  of  the  spectacles  which 
are  presented,  but  scarcely  conscious  of  them.  But  it  is  not 
merely  because  the  bar  itself  is  under  the  operation  of  the  inci- 
dents which  furnish  the  materials  of  their  professional  occupa- 
tion that  I  have  selected  the  last  assizes  at  Olonmel  as  the 
subject  of  this  article.  The  extensive  circulation  of  this  peri- 
odical work  affords  the  opportunity  of  putting  the  English  pub- 
lic in  possession  of  many  illustrative  facts;  and  in  narrating 
the  events  which  attended  the  murder  of  Daniel  Mara,  and  the 
trial  of  his  assassins,  I  propose  to  myself  the  useful  end  of  fix- 
ing the  general  attention  upon  a  state  of  things  which  ought 
to  lead  all  wise  and  good  men  to  the  consideration  of  the  only 
effectual  means  by  which  the  evils  which  result  from  the  moral 
condition  of  the  country  may  be  remedied.* 

In  the  month  of  April,  1827,  a  gentleman  of  the  name  of 
Chadwick  was  murdered  in  the  open  day,  at  a  place  called 
Rath  Cannon,  in  the  immediate  vicinity  of  the  old  Abbey  of 
Holycross.  Mr.  Chadwick  was  the  member  of  an  influential 
family,  and  was  employed  as  land-agent  in  collecting  their 
rents.  The  person  who  fills  this  office  in  England  is  called 
"  a  steward ;"  but  in  Ireland  it  is  designated  by  the  more  hon- 
orable name  of  a  land-agency.  The  discharge  of  the  duties 
of  this  situation  must  be  always  more  or  less  obnoxious.  In 
times  of  public  distress,  the  landlord,  who  is  himself  urged  by 
his  own  creditors,  urges  his  agent  on,  and  the  latter  inflicts 
upon  the  tenants  the  necessities  of  his  employer. 

I  have  heard  that  Mr.  Chadwick  was  not  peculiarly  rigorous 
in  the  exaction  of  rent,  but  he  was  singularly  injudicious  in 
his  demeanor  toward  the  lower  orders.  He  believed  that  they 
detested  him;  and,  possessing  personal  courage,  bade  them 
defiance.  He  was  not  a  man  of  a  bad  heart ;  but  was  despotic 
and  contumelious  in  his  manners  to  those  whose  hatred  he  re- 
turned with  contempt.  It  is  said  that  he  used  to  stand  among 
a  body  of  the  peasantry,  and,  observing  that  his  corpulency 
was  on  the  increase,  was  accustomed  to  exclaim,  "  I  think  I 
am  fattening  upon  your  curses !"  In  answer  to  these  taunts 
*  This  sliotch  was  published  in  July,  1828.— M. 


MURDER    OF   MR.    CTIADWICK.  43 

the  peasants  who  surrounded  him,  and  who  were  well  habitu- 
ated  to  the  concealment  of  their  fierce  and  terrible  passions, 
affected  to  laugh,  and  said  that  "his  honor  was  mighty  pleas- 
ant; and  sure  his  honor,  God  bless  him,  was  always  fond  of 
his  joke  !"  But  while  they  indulged  in  the  sycophancy  under 
which  they  are  wont  to  smother  their  sanguinary  detestations, 
they  were  lying  in  wait  for  the  occasion  of  revenge.  Perhaps, 
however,  they  would  not  have  proceeded  to  the  extremities  to 
which  they  had  recourse,  but  for  a  determination  evinced  by 
Mr.  Chad  wick  to  take  effectual  means  for  keeping  them  in  awe 
He  set  about  building  a  police-barrack  at  Rath  Cannon.  It 
was  resolved  that  Mr.  Chadwick  should  die. 

This  d'ecision  was  not  the  result  of  individual  vengeance. 
The  wide  confederacy  into  which  the  lower  orders  are  organ 
ized  in  Tipperary  held  council  upon  him,  and  the  village  are- 
opagus  pronounced  his  sentence.     It  remained  to  find  an  exe- 
cutioner. 

Patrick  Grace,  who  was  almost  a  boy,  but  was  distinguished 
by  various  feats  of  guilty  courage,  offered  himself  as  a  volun- 
teer in  what  was  regarded  by  him  as  an  honorable  cause.  He 
had  set  up  in  the  county  as  a  sort  of  knight-errant  against 
landlords;  and,  in  the  spirit  of  a  barbarous  chivalry,  proffered 
his  gratuitous  services  wherever  what  he  conceived  to  be  a 
wrong  was  to  be  redressed.  He  proceeded  to  Rath  Cannon  ; 
and,  "without  adopting  any  sort  of  precaution,  and  while  the 
public  road  was  traversed  by  numerous  passengers,  in  the  broad 
daylight,  and  just  beside  the  barrack,  in  the  construction  of 
which  Mr.  Chadwick  was  engaged,  shot  that  unfortunate  gen- 
tleman, avIio  fell  instantly  dead. 

This  dreadful  crime  produced  a  great  sensation,  not  only  in 
the  county  where  it  was  perpetrated,  but  through  the  whole  of 
Ireland.  When  it  was  announced  in  Dublin,  it  created  a  sort 
of  dismay,  as  it  evinced  the  spirit  of  atrocious  intrepidity  to 
which  the  peasantry  had  been  roused.  It  was  justly  accounted, 
by  those  who  looked  upon  this  savage  assassination  with  most 
horror,  as  furnishing  evidence  of  the  moral  condition  of  the 
people,  and  as  intimating  the  consequences  which  might  be 
anticipated  from  the  ferocity  of  the  peasantry,  if  ever  they 


44  CLONMEL    ASSIZES. 

should  be  let  loose.  Patrick  Grace  calculated  on  impunity ; 
but  his  confidence  in  the  power  and  terrors  of  the  confederacy 
with  which  he  was  associated  was  mistaken.  A  brave,  and  a 
religious  man,  whose  name  was  Philip  Mara,  was  present  at 
the  murder.  He  was  standing  beside  his  employer,  Mr.  Chad- 
wick,  and  saw  Grace  put  him  deliberately  to  death.  Grace 
was  well  aware  that  Mara  had  seen  him,  but  did  not  believe 
that  he  would  dare  to  give  evidence  against  him.  It  is  proba- 
ble, too,  that  he  conjectured  that  Mara  coincided  with  him  in 
his  ethics  of  assassination,  and  applauded  the  proceeding. 
Mara,  however,  who  was  a  moral  and  virtuous  man,  was  horror- 
struck  by  what  he  had  beheld ;  and,  under  the  influence  of 
conscientious  feelings,  gave  immediate  information  to  a  magis- 
trate. Patrick  Grace  was  arrested,  and  tried  at  the  summer 
assizes  of  1827. 

I  was  not  present  at  his  trial,  but  have  heard  from  good  au- 
thority that  he  displayed  a  fearless  demeanor;  and  that  when 
he  was  convicted  upon  the  evidence  of  Philip  Mara,  he  de- 
clared that  before  a  year  should  go  by  he  should  have  ven- 
geance in  the  grave.  He  was  ordered  to  be  executed  near  the 
spot  where  his  misdeed  had  been  perpetrated.  This  was  a 
signal  mistake,  and  produced  an  effect  exactly  the  reverse  of 
what  was  contemplated.  The  lower  orders  looked  upon  him 
as  a  martyr;  and  his  deportment,  personal  beauty,  and  un- 
daunted courage,  rendered  him  an  object  of  deep  interest  and 
sympathy  upon  the  scaffold.  He  was  attended  by  a  body  of 
troops  to  the  old  Abbey  of  Holycross,  where  not  less  than 
fifteen  thousand  people  assembled  to  behold  him. 

The  site  of  the  execution  rendered  the  spectacle  a  most  stri- 
king one.  I^he  Abbey  of  Holycross  is  the  finest  and  most  ven- 
erable monastic  ruin  in  Ireland.  Most  travellers  turn  from 
their  way  to  survey  it,  and  leave  it  with  a  deep  impression  of 
its  solemnity  and  grandeur.  A  vast  multitude  was  assembled 
round  the  scaffold.  The  prisoner  was  brought  forward  in  the 
midst  of  the  profound  silence  of  the  people.  He  ascended  and 
surveyed  them  ;  and  looked  upon  the  ruins  of  the  edifice  which 
had  once  been  dedicated  to  the  worship  of  his  religion,  and  to 
the  sepulchres  of  the  dead  which  were  strewed  among  its  aisles. 


EXECUTION    OF    PATRICK    GRACE.  45 

and  Lad  been  for  ages  as  lie  was  in  a  few  minutes  about  to  be. 
ft  was  not  known  whether  he  would  call  for  vengeance  from 
his  survivors,  or  for  mercy  from  Heaven.  His  kindred,  his 
close  friends,  his  early  companions,  all  that  he  loved,  and  all 
to  whom  he  was  dear,  were  around  him,  and  nothing,  except 
a  universal  sob  from  his  female  relatives,  disturbed  the  awful 
taciturnity  that  prevailed.  At  the  side  of  Patrick  Grace  stood 
the  priest  —  the  mild  admonitor  of  the  heart,  the  soother  of 
affliction,  and  the  preceptor  of  forgiveness  —  who  attended  him 
in  the  last  office  of  humanity,  and  who  proved  by  the  result 
how  well  he  had  performed  it. 

To  the  disappointment  of  the  people,  Patrick  Grace  ex- 
pressed himself  profoundly  contrite;  and,  although  he  evinced 
no  fear  of  death,  at  the  instance  of  the  Roman  Catholic  clergy- 
man who  attended  him,  implored  the  people  to  take  warning 
by  his  example.  In  a  few  moments  after,  he  left  existence. 
But  the  effect  of  his  execution  will  be  estimated  by  this  re- 
markable incident.  His  gloves  were  handed  by  one  of  his 
relations  to  an  old  man  of  the  name  of  John  Russel,  as  a  keep- 
sake. Russel  drew  them  on,  and  declared  at  the  same  time 
that  he  should  wear  them  "  till  Paddy  Grace  was  revenged  ;" 
and  revenged  he  soon  afterward  was,  within  the  time  which 
he  had  himself  prescribed  for  retribution,  and  in  a  manner 
which  is  as  much  calculated  to  excite  astonishment  at  the 
strangeness,  as  detestation  for  the  atrocity  of  the  crime,  of 
which  I  proceed  to  narrate  the  details. 

Philip  Mara  was  removed  by  Government  from  the  country. 
It  was  perfectly  obvious  that,  if  he  had  continued  to  sojourn  in 
Tipperary,  his  life  would  have  been  taken  speedily,  and  at  all 
hazards,  away.  It  was  decided  that  all  his  kindred  should  be 
exterminated.  He  had  three  brothers;  and  the  bare  consan- 
guinity with  a  traitor  (for  his  crime  Mas  treason)  was  regarded 
as  a  sufficient  offence  to  justify  their  immolation.  If  they 
could  not  procure  his  own  blood  for  the  purposes  of  sacrifice, 
it  was  however  something  to  make  libation  of  that  which 
flowed  from  the  same  source.  The  crimes  of  the  Irish  are  de- 
rived from  the  same  origin  as  their  virtues.  They  have  pow- 
erful domestic  attachments.     Their  love  and  devotion  to  their 


46  CLONMEL    ASSIZES. 

kindred  instruct  them  in  the  worst  expedients  of  atrocity. 
Knowing  the  affection  which  Mara  had  for  his  brothers,  they 
found  the  way  to  his  heart  in  the  kindest  instincts  of  humani- 
ty ;  and,  from  the  consciousness  of  the  pain  which  the  murder 
of  "  his  mother's  children"  would  inflict,  determined  that  he 
should  endure  it. 

It  must  be  owned  that  there  is  a  dreadful  policy  in  this  sys- 
tem. The  Government  may  withdraw  their  witnesses  from  the 
country,  and  afford  them  protection  ;  but  their  wives,  their  off- 
spring, their  parents,  their  brothers,  sisters,  nay  their  remotest 
relatives,  can  not  be  secure,  and  the  vengeance  of  the  ferocious 
peasantry,  if  defrauded  of  its  more  immediate  and  natural 
object,  will  satiate  itself  with  some  other  victim.  It  was  in 
conformity  with  these  atrocious  principles  of  revenge  that  the 
murder  of  the  brothers  of  Philip  Mara  was  resolved  upon. 
Strange  to  tell,  the  whole  body  of  the  peasantry  in  the  neigh- 
borhood of  Rath  Cannon,  and  far  beyond  it,  entered  into  a 
league,  for  the  perpetration  of  this  abominable  crime;  and 
while  the  individuals  who  were  marked  out  for  massacre  were 
unconscious  of  what  was  going  forward,  scarcely  a  man,  woman, 
or  child,  looked  them  in  the  face  who  did  not  know  that  they 
were  marked  out  for  death. 

They  were  masons  by  trade,  and  were  employed  in  building 
the  barrack  at  Rath  Cannon,  on  the  spot  where  ChadAvick  had 
been  assassinated,  and  where  the  funeral  of  Patrick  Grace  (for 
so  his  execution  was  called)  had  been  performed.  The  peas- 
antry looked  in  all  probability  with  an  evil  eye  upon  every 
man  who  had  put  his  hand  to  this  obnoxious  work ;  but  their 
main  object  was  the  extermination  of  Philip  Mara's  brothers. 
They  were  three  in  number — Daniel,  Laurence,  and  Timothy. 
On  the  first  of  October  they  were  at  work,  with  an  apprentice 
in  the  mason  trade,  at  the  barrack  at  Rath  Cannon.  The  name 
of  this  apprentice  was  Hickey.  In  the  evening,  about  five 
o'clock,  they  left  off  their  work,  and  were  returning  homeward, 
when  eight  men  with  arms  rushed  upon  them.  They  were 
fired  at ;  but  the  firearms  of  the  assassins  were  in  such  bad  con- 
dition, that  the  discharge  of  their  rude  musketry  had  no  effect. 
Laurence,  Timothy,  and  the  apprentice,  fled  in  different  direc- 


MTJEDER   OF    DANIEL   MARA  47 

tions,  and  escaped.  Daniel  Mara  lost  liis  presence  of  mind, 
and  instead  of  taking  the  same  route  as  the  others,  ran  into  the 
house  of  a  poor  widow.  He  was  pursued  by  the  murderers, 
one  of  whom  got  in  by  a  small  window,  while  the  others  burst 
through  the  door,  and  with  circumstances  of  great  savageness 
put  him  to  death. 

The  intelligence  of  this  event  produced  a  still  greater  sen- 
sation than  the  murder  of  Chadwick;  and  was  as  much  the 
subject  of  comment  as  some  great  political  incident,  fraught 
with  national  consequences,  in  the  metropolis.  The  Govern- 
ment lost  no  time  in  issuing  proclamations,  offering  a  reward 
of  two  thousand  pounds  sterling  for  information  which  should 
bring  the  assassins  to  justice.  The  magnitude  of  the  sum  in- 
duced the  hope  that  its  temptation  would  be  found  irresistible 
to  poverty  and  destitution  so  great  as  that  which  prevails 
among  the  class  of  ordinary  malefactors.  It  was  well  known 
that  hundreds  had  cognizance  of  the  offence;  and  it  was  con- 
cluded that,  among  so  numerous  a  body,  the  tender  of  so  large 
a  reward  could  not  fail  to  offer  an  effectual  allurement.  Weeks, 
however,  passed  over  without  the  communication  of  intelligence 
of  any  kind.  Several  persons  were  arrested  on  suspicion,  but 
were  afterward  discharged,  as  no  more  than  mere  conjecture 
could  be  adduced  against  them. 

Mr.  Doherty,  the  Solicitor-General,  proceeded  to  the  county 
of  Tipperary,  in  order  to  investigate  the  transaction  ;  but  for  a 
considerable  time  all  his  scrutiny  was  without  avail.  At  length, 
however,  an  individual  of  the  name  of  Thomas  Fitzgerald  was 
committed  to  jail  upon  a  charge  of  highway  robbery,  and,  in 
order  to  save  his  life,  furnished  evidence  upon  which  the  Gov- 
ernment was  enabled  to  pierce  into  the  mysteries  of  delin- 
quency. The  moment  Fitzgerald  unsealed  his  lips,  a  numer- 
ous horde  of  malefactors  were  taken  up,  and  further  reveal- 
ments  were  made  under  the  influence  which  the  love  of  life, 
and  not  of  money,  exercised  over  their  minds.  The  assizes 
came  on;  and  on  Monday,  the  31st  of  March  [1828],  Patrick 
Lacy  and  John  Walsh  were  placed  at  the  bar,  and  to  the  in- 
dictment for  the  murder  of  Daniel  Mara  pleaded  not  guilty, 

fhe  ^ ourt  presented  a  very  imposing  spectacle.     The  whole 


48  Clonmel  assizes. 

body  of  the  gentry  of  Tipperary  were  assembled  in  order  to 
witness  a  trial  on  whicli  the  security  of  life  and  property  was 
to  depend.  The  box  which  is  devoted  to  the  grand-jury  was 
thronged  with  the  aristocracy  of  the  county,  who  manifested 
an  anxiety  far  stronger  than  the  trial  of  an  ordinary  culprit  is 
accustomed  to  produce.  An  immense  crowd  of  the  peasantry 
was  gathered  round  the  dock.  All  appeared  to  feel  a  deep 
interest  in  what  was  to  take  place,  but  it  was  easy  to  perceive 
in  the  diversity  of  solicitude  which  was  expressed  upon  their 
faces,  the  degrees  of  sympathy  which  connected  them  with  the 
prisoners  at  the  bar.  The  more  immediate  kindred  of  the  mal- 
efactors were  distinguishable,  by  their  profound  but  still  emo- 
tion, from  those  who  were  engaged  in  the  same  extensive  or- 
ganization, and  were  actuated  by  a  selfish  sense  that  their  per- 
sonal interests  were  at  stake,  without  having  their  more  tender 
affections  involved  in  the  result. 

But  besides  the  relatives  and  confederates  of  the  prisoners, 
there  was  a  third  class  among  the  spectators,  in  whicli  another 
shade  of  sympathy  was  observable.  These  were  the  mass  of 
the  peasantry,  who  had  no  direct  concern  with  the  transaction, 
but  whose  principles  and  habits  made  them  well-wishers  to  the 
men  who  had  put  their  lives  in  peril  for  what  was  regarded  as 
the  common  cause.  Through  the  crowd  were  dispersed  a  num- 
ber of  policemen,  whose  green  regimentals,  high  caps,  and  glit- 
tering bayonets,  made  them  conspicuous,  and  brought  them 
into  contrast  with  the  peasants  by  whom  they  were  surrounded. 
On  the  table  stood  the  governor  of  the  jail,  with  his  ponderous 
keys,  which  designated  his  office,  and  presented  to  the  mind 
associations  which  aided  the  effect  of  the  scene. 

Mr.  Justice  Moore  appeared  in  his  red  robes  lined  with  black, 
and  intimated  by  his  aspect  that  he  anticipated  the  discharge 
of  a  dreadful  duty.  Beside  him  was  placed  the  Earl  of  Kings- 
ton,* who  had  come  from  the  neighboring  county  of  Cork  to 

*  Mr.  Shell's  description  of  the  late  Earl  of  Kingston  is  very  accurate,  but 
words  can  not  paint  the  brutality  of  this  man's  appearance.  When  I  was  a 
lad,  I  often  saw  him,  as  he  was  Chairman  of  the  Magistrates  at  the  Sessions, 
in  Fermoy,  where  I  was  educated  —  one  schoolmate  being  Fi'ancis  Hineks, 
now  of  Canada,  and  the  schoolmaster  being  Dr.  Hincks?  his  father.     The  Eur. 


THE   EARL    OF   KINGSTON.  49 

witness  the  trial,  md  whose  great  possessions  gave  him  a  pe- 
culiar concern  in  tracing  to  their  sources  the  disturbances  which 
had  already  a  formidable  character,  and  intimated  still  more 

of  Kingston  was  an  immense  man,  bulky  and  burly,  with  his  features  almost 
hidden  in  a  mass  of  dark  whiskers,  and  his  deep-set  eyes  glaring  beneath 
shaggy,  black  eyebrows,  and  a  forehead  "  villanous  low."  His  voice,  that 
all  might  be  en^suile,  was  at  once  deep  and  loud.  I  never  saw  a  man  who  had 
a  more  brutal  appearance.  He  took  large  quantities  of  snuff,  which  he  carried 
loose  in  a  waistcoat-pocket  lined  with  tin,  and  his  method  was  to  take  small 
handfuls  of  it,  throw  part  of  it  up  into  his  immense  nostrils,  and  fling  away  the 
remainder  over  his  left  shoulder  —  the  consequence  of  which  was,  that  nobody 
who  knew  him  would  sit  upon  that  side.  When  he  was  a  young  man,  he  held 
a  commission  in  the  North  Cork  Militia  —  a  corps  of  Orangemen,  who  commit- 
ted fearful  barbarities  in  the  fatal  1798,  and  used  to  amuse  themselves,  when 
they  did  shoot  or  bayonet  a  suspected  "  rebel,"  with  setting  fire  to  his  house, 
filling  a  brown  paper  cone  with  hot  pitch,  thrusting  it  upon  his  shorn  head,  and 
enjoying  the  "  fun"  of  seeing  him  writhe  under  the  torture,  and  laughing  at 
him  as  the  hot  fluid  ran  down  his  face  and  breast.  The  "  rebels"  made  a 
prisoner  of  Lord  Kingston,  and  his  life  was  very  much  in  danger  —  for  he  was 
well  known,  and  much  hated.  They  employed  him,  however,  to  make  terms 
for  them  with  the  Royalists,  and  he  was  allowed  to  depart,  on  his  solemn  prom- 
ise to  perform  their  wish.  The  moment  he  reached  his  friends,  he  made  use 
of  the  information  as  to  the  strength  of  the  "  rebels,"  which  he  had  picked  up, 
while  a  captive,  utterly  betrayed  the  trust  reposed  in  him,  and  broke  his 
plighted  word  of  honor,  by  setting  on  his  soldiers  to  massacre  the  trusting  foe. 
The  populace,  who  recollected  this,  constantly  predicted  a  violent  death  to  this 
man  brute.  They  rejoiced  when  the  news  reached  them,  in  October,  1839, 
that  the  Earl  of  Kingston,  after  some  years'  dreadful  sufferings,  had  miserably 
died,  in  London,  of  morbus  pediculosus  —  the  dreadful  disease  by  which  King 
Herod  perished  in  his  pride.  He  erected  the  Castle  of  Mitchelstown  as  a 
residence  ;  and  I  recollect  that  the  men,  who  quarried  the  limestone  of  which 
it  is  built,  were  paid  only  eight  cents  a  day  for  twelve  hours'  work.  A  very 
different  man  was  his  eldest  son,  the  Viscount  Kingsborough,  author  of  that 
magnificent  work,  "The  Antiquities  of  Mexico."  Born  in  1795,  he  represent- 
ed his  native  county  (Cork),  in  the  Parliament  of  1820-'26.  Thenceforth,  he 
devoted  himself  to  literary  and  antiouarian  researches.  In  1831,  was  published 
his  great  work  on  Mexico,  in  six  foZo  volumes,  got  up  at  a  cost  of  many  thou- 
sand pounds.  The  illustrations  consisted  of  fac-simile  engravings  from  draw- 
ings and  MSS.,  in  the  royal  libraries  of  Paris,  Dresden,  and  Berlin  ;  the 
imperial  library  of  Vienr.a;  the  library  of  the  Vatican  ;  the  Borgean  Museum; 
the  library  of  the  Institute  at  Bologna;  the  collections  of  Laud  and  Selden  in 
the  Bodleian,  at  Oxford.  Four  copies  of  this  work  —  the  largest  ever  pub- 
lished by  an  author,  on  his  own  account — were  printed  upon  vellum  ;  of  these 
he  presented  one  to  the  Bodleian  library,  and  another  to  the  British  Museum. 
The  price  of  an  ordinary  copy  was  a  hundred  and  eighty  guineas.  The  work 
Vol.  II.— 3 


50  CLONMEL    ASSIZES. 

terrible  results.  His  dark  and  massive  countenance,  with  a 
shaggy  and  wild  profusion  of  hair,  his  bold,  imperious  lip,  and 
large  and  deeply-set  eye,  and  his  huge  and  vigorous  frame, 
rendered  him  a  remarkable  object,  without  reference  to  his 
high  rank  and  station,  and  to  the  political  part  which  he  had 
played  in  circumstances  of  which  it  is  not  impossible  that  he 
may  witness,  although  he  should  desire  to  avert,  the  return. 

The  prisoners  at  the  bar  stood  composed  and  firm.  Lacy, 
the  youngest,  was  dressed  with  extreme  care  and  neatness. 
He  was  a  tall,  handsome  young  man,  with  a  soft  and  healthful 
color,  and  a  bright  and  tranquil  eye.  I  was  struck  by  the  un- 
usual whiteness  of  his  hands,  which  were  loosely  attached  to 
each  other.  Walsh,  his  fellow-prisoner  and  his  brother  in 
crime,  was  a  stout,  short,  and  square-built  man,  with  a  sturdy 
look,  in  which  there  was  more  fierceness  than  in  Lacy's  coun- 
tenance; yet  the  latter  was  a  far  more  guilty  malefactor,  and 
had  been  engaged  in  numerous  achievements  of  the  same  kind, 
whereas  Walsh  bore  an  excellent  reputation,  and  obtained 
from  his  landlord,  Mr.  Creagh,  the  highest  testimony  to  his 
character. 

The  Solicitor-General,  Mr.  Doherty,  rose  to  state  the  case. 
He  appeared  more  deeply  impressed  than  I  have  ever  seen 
any  public  officer,  with  the  responsibility  which  had  devolved 
upon  him;  and,  by  his  solemn  and  emphatic  manner,  rendered 
a  narration,  which  was  pregnant  with  aAvful  facts,  so  impres- 
sive, that,  during  a  speech  of  several  hours'  continuance,  he 
kept  attention  upon  the  watch,  and  scarcely  a  noise  was  heard, 
except  when  some  piece  of  evidence  was  announced  which  sur- 
prised the  prisoners,  and  made  them  give  a  slight  start,  in 
which  their  astonishment  and  alarm  at  the  extent  of  the  infor- 
mation of  the  Government  were  expressed.* 

can  not  be  obtained  now,  it  is  so  scarce,  but  a  copy  is  in  the  Astor  Library,  New 
York.  —  Viscount  Kingsborough  was  unfortunately  induced  to  become  security 
for  debts  incurred  by  bis  father,  and  that  worthy  actually  allowed  him  to  be- 
come an  inmate  of  the  Sheriffs  Prison,  in  Dublin,  where  he  died,  of  typhus 
fever,  on  the  27th  of  February,  1837,  aged  forty-two. — M. 

*  The  speech  of  Mr.  Doherty  was  highly  eloquent.  He  took  occasion  to 
describe  the  general  condition  of  the  county  in  language  equally  simple,  pow- 
pifulj  and  true.     To  the  causes  of  that  condition  he  did  not  adve  t,  for  ip  did 


Tiffi   MURDER   OF   DANIEL    MARA.  5l 

They  preserved  their  composure  while  Mr.  Doherty  was  de- 
tailing the  evidence  of  Fitzgerald,  for  they  well  knew  that  he 
had  become  what  is  technically  called  "  a  stag,"  and  turned 
informer.  Neither  were  they  greatly  moved  at  learning  that 
another  traitor  of  the  name  of  Ryan  was  to  be  produced,  for 
rumors  had  gone  abroad  that  he  was  to  corroborate  Fitzgerald. 
They  were  well  aware  that  the  jury  would  require  more  evi- 
dence than  the  coincidence  of  swearing  between  two  accom- 
plices could  supply.  It  is,  indeed,  held  that  one  accomplice 
can  sustain  another  for  the  purposes  of  conviction,  and  that 
their  concurrence  is  sufficient  to  warrant  a  verdict  of  guilty; 
still  juries  are  in  the  habit  of  demanding  some  better  founda- 
tion for  their  findings,  and,  before  they  take  life  away,  exact  a 
confirmation  from  some  pure  and  unquestionable  source. 

The  counsel  for  the  prisoners  participated  with  them  in  the 
belief  that  the  Crown  would  not  be  able  to  produce  any  wit- 
nesses except  accomplices,  and  listened,  therefore,  to  the  de- 
tails of  the  murder  of  Daniel  Mara,  however  minute,  without 
much  apprehension  for  their  clients,  until  Mr.  Doherty,  turning 
toward  the  dock,  and  lifting  up  and  shaking  his  hand,  pro- 
nounced the  name  of  "  Kate  Costello."  It  smote  the  prisoners 
with  dismay  !     At  the  time,  however,  that  Mr.  Doherty  made 

not  fall  within  his  official  province  to  do  so ;  but  he  has  since,  in  the  House  of 
Commons,  pointed  out  what  he  conceived  to  be  the  real  sources  of  these  de- 
plorable evils.  I  regret  that  Mr.  Doherty  did  not  take  the  pains  to  publish  his 
speeches  at  Clonmel.  Justice  has  not  been  done  to  the  diction  in  the  newspapers 
in  which  they  were  reported.  The  publication  of  those  speeches  in  an  authentic 
form  would  not  only  evince  the  talents  of  the  able  advocate  by  whom  they  were 
delivered,  but  would  also  have  the  effect  of  showing-,  in  a  striking  view,  the 
unfairness  of  not  allowing  the  counsel  for  the  prison0'  s  to  speak,  while  the 
Crown  enlists  all  the  power  of  rhetoric  against  them.  The  fa*dt  is  not  with 
Mr.  Doherty,  but  in  the  system.  "  Aperi  os  tuum  muto,  et  vindica  inopem,"  is 
written  in  golden  letters  in  the  Court.  The  law,  instead  of  vindicating  the 
poor  man,  shuts  his  counsel's  mouth.  I  have  seen  many  cases  where  a  pow- 
erful speech  might  have  saved  a  prisoner's  life.  A  good  appeal  to  the  Jmy 
would  have  preserved  two  of  the  men  who  were  convicted  of  the  murder  of 
Barry,  at  Clonmel.  It  is  said  that  Judges  would  not  have  time  to  go  through 
the  trials,  if  counsel  for  the  prisoners  were  allowed  to  speak.  In  other  words, 
they  would  be  delayed  from  their  vacation  villas  upon  circuit.  What  an  excuse 
[The  law  has  been  changed  since  this  was  written,  and  counsel  are  allowed  to 
all  prisoners.  —  M.") 


6'2  Clonmel  Assizes. 

tills  announcement,  he  was  himself  uncertain,  I  believe,  whether 
Kate  Oostello  would  consent  to  give  the  necessary  evidence; 
and  there  was  reason  to  calculate  upon  her  reluctance  to  make 
any  disclosure  by  which  the  lives  of  "  her  people,"  as  the  lower 
orders  call  their  kindred,  should  be  affected. 

The  statement  of  Mr.  Doherty,  which  was  afterward  fully 
made  out  in  proof,  showed  that  a  wide  conspiracy  had  been 
framed  in  order  to  murder  Philip  Mara's  brothers.  Fitzgerald 
and  Lacy,  who  did  not  reside  in  the  neighborhood  of  Hath 
Cannon,  were  sent  for  by  the  relatives  of  Patrick  Grace,  as  it 
was  well  known  that  they  were  ready  for  the  undertaking  of 
"  the  job."  They  received  their  instructions,  and  were  joined 
by  other  assassins.  The  band  proceeded  to  Rath  Cannon,  in 
order  to  execute  their  purpose,  but  an  accident  prevented  their 
victims  from  coming  to  the  place  where  they  were  expected, 
and  the  assassination  was,  in  consequence,  adjourned  for  an- 
other week.  In  the  interval,  however,  they  did  not  relent; 
but,  on  the  contrary,  a  new  supply  of  murderers  was  collected, 
and  on  Sunday,  the  30th  day  of  September  [1828],  the  day  pre- 
ceding the  murder,  they  met  again  in  the  house  of  a  farmer,  of 
the  name  of  Jack  Keogh,  who  lived  beside  the  barrack  where 
the  Maras  were  at  work.  Here  they  were  attended  by  Kate 
Oostello,  the  fatal  witness,  by  whom  their  destiny  was  to  be 
sealed. 

On  the  morning  of  Monday,  the  1st  of  October,  they  pro- 
ceeded to  an  elevation  called  "  The  Grove,"  a  hill  covered 
with  trees,  in  which  arms  had  been  deposited.  This  hill  over- 
looked the  barrack  where  the  Maras  were  at  work.  A  party 
of  conspirators  joined  the  chief  assassins  on  this  spot,  and  Kate 
Oostello,  a  servant  and  near  relative  of  the  Keoghs  (who  were 
engaged  in  the  murder),  again  attended  them.  She  brought 
them  food  and  spirits.  From  this  ambush  they  remained  watch- 
ing their  prey  until  five  o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  when  it  was 
announced  that  the  Maras  were  coming  down  from  the  scaf- 
fold ing  on  which  they  were  raising  the  barrack.  It  appeared 
that  some  murderers  did  not  know  the  persons  whose  lives 
they  were  to  take  away,  and  that  their  dress  was  mentioned 
as  the  means  of  recognition.     They  advanced  to  the  number 


THE  MURDER  OF  DANIEL  MARA.  53 

of  eight,  and,  as  I  have  already  intimated,  succeeded  in  slay- 
ing one  only  of  the  three  brothers. 

But  the  most  illustrative  incident  in  the  whole  transaction 
was  not  what  took  place  at  the  murder,  but  a  circumstance 
which  immediately  succeeded  it.  The  assassins,  with  their 
hands  red  with  the  gore  of  man,  proceeded  to  the  house  cf  ? 
farmer  in  good  circumstances,  whose  name  was  John  Russel- 
He  was  a  man  of  a  decent  aspect  and  demeanor,  above  the 
lower  class  of  peasants  in  station  and  habits,  was  not  destitute 
of  education,  spoke  and  reasoned  well,  and  was  accounted  very 
orderly  and  well  conducted.  One  would  suppose  that  he 
would  have  closed  his  doors  against  the  wretches  who  were 
still  reeking  with  their  crime.  He  gave  them  welcome,  ten- 
dered them  his  hospitality,  and  provided  them  with  food.  In 
the  room  where  they  were  received  by  this  hoary  delinquent, 
there  were  two  individuals  of  a  very  different  character  and 
aspect  from  each  other.  The  one  was  a  girl,  Mary  Russel,  the 
daughter  of  old  Jack  Russel,  the  proprietor  of  the  house.  She 
was  young,  and  of  an  exceedingly  interesting  appearance  ;  her 
manners  were  greatly  superior  to  persons  of  her  class,  and  she 
was  delicate  and  gentle  in  her  habitual  conduct  and  demeanor. 
Near  her  there  sat  an  old  woman,  in  the  most  advanced  stage 
of  life,  who  was  a  kind  of  Elspeth  among  them,  and  from  her 
age  and  relationship  was  an  object  of  respect  and  regard.  The 
moment  the  assassins  entered,  Mary  Russel  rushed  up  to  them, 
and,  with  a  vehement  earnestness,  exclaimed,  "  Did  you  do  any 
good  ?"  They  stated  in  reply  that  one  of  the  Maras  was  shot ; 
when  Peg  Russel  (the  withered  hag),  who  sat  moping  in  the 
revery  of  old  age,  till  her  attention  was  aroused  by  the  sangui- 
nary intelligence,  lifted  her  shrivelled  hand,  and  cried  out  with 
a  shrill  and  vehement  bitterness,  "  You  might  as  well  not  have 
killed  any,  since  you  did  not  kill  them  all!" 

Strange  and  dreadful  condition  of  Ireland  !  The  witness  to 
a  murder  denounces  it.  He  flies  the  country.  His  brothers, 
for  his  crime,  are  doomed  to  die.  The  whole  population  con- 
federate in  their  death.  For  weeks  the  conspiracy  is  planned, 
and  no  relenting  spirit  interposes  in  their  slaughterous  deliber* 
ations.     The  appointed  day  arrives,  and  the  murder  of  an  inno- 


&4  CLOMEL   ASSIZER. 

cent  man  is  effected,  while  the  light  is  still  shining,  and  with 
the  eye  of  man,  which  is  as  little  feared  as  that  of  God,  upon 
them.  The  murderers  leave  the  spot  where  their  fellow-crea 
ture  lies  weltering;  and,  instead  of  being  regarded  as  objects 
of  execration  and  of  horror,  are  chid,  by  women  for  their  re- 
missness in  the  work  of  death,  and  for  the  scantiness  of  the 
blood  which  they  had  poured  out!  Thus  it  is  that  in  this 
unfortunate  country  not  only  men  are  made  barbarous,  but 
women  are  unsexed,  and  filled  — 

■"  from  the  crown  to  the  toe,  top-full 


Of  direst  cruelty !" 

These  were  the  facts  which  Mr.  Doherty  stated,  and  they 
were  established  by  the  evidence.  The  first  witness  was  Fitz- 
gerald. When  he  was  called,  he  did  not  appear  on  the  instant, 
for  he  was  kept  in  a  room  adjoining  the  Court,  in  order  that 
he  might  not  avail  himself  of  the  statement,  and  fit  his  evidence 
to  it.  His  testimony  was  of  such  importance,  and  it  was  known 
that  so  much  depended  upon  it,  that  his  arrival  was  waited  for 
with  strong  expectation  ;  and,  in  the  interval  before  his  appear- 
ance on  the  table,  the  mind  had  leisure  to  form  some  conjec- 
tural picture  of  what  he  in  all  likelihood  was.  I  imagined 
that  he  must  be  some  fierce-looking,  savage  wretch,  with  base- 
ness and  perfidy,  intermingled  with  atrocity,  in  his  brow,  and 
whose  meanness  would  bespeak  the  informer,  as  his  ferocity 
would  proclaim  the  assassin.     I  was  deceived. 

His  coming  was  announced  —  way  was  made  for  him  —  and 
I  saw  leap  upon  the  table,  with  an  air  of  easy  indifference  and 
manly  familiarity,  a  tall,  athletic  young  man,  about  two  or 
three  and  twenty,  with  a  countenance  as  intelligent  in  expres- 
sion and  symmetrical  in  feature,  as  his  limbs  were  vigorous 
and  well-proportioned.  His  head  was  perfectly  shaped,  and 
surmounted  a  neck  of  singular  strength  and  breadth,  which 
lay  open  and  rose  out  of  a  chest  of  unusual  massiveness  and 
dilation.  His  eyes  were  of  deep  and  brilliant  black,  full  of 
fire  and  energy,  intermixed  with  an  expression  of  slyness  and 
sagacity.  They  had  a  peculiarly-watchful  look,  and  indicated 
a  vehemence  of  character,  checked  and  tempered  by  a  cautious 


MtmDEft  OF  DANIEL  MARA,  55 

and  observant  spirit.  The  nose  was  well  formed  and  deeply 
rooted,  but  rose  at  the  end  with  some  suddenness,  which  took 
off  from  the  dignity  of  the  countenance,  but  displayed  consid- 
erable breadth  about  the  nostrils,  which  were  made  to  breathe 
fierceness  and  disdain.  The  mouth  of  the  villain  (for  he  was 
one  of  the  first  magnitude)  was  composed  of  thick  but  well- 
shaped  lips,  in  which  firmness  and  intrepidity  were  strongly 
marked ;  and,  when  opened,  disclosed  a  range  of  teeth  of  the 
finest  form  and  color.  His  hair  was  short  and  thick,  but  his 
cheek  was  so  fresh  and  fair,  that  he  scarcely  seemed  to  have 
ever  had  any  beard. 

The  fellow's  dress  was  calculated  to  set  off  his  figure.  It 
left  his  breast  almost  bare,  and,  the  knees  of  his  breeches  being 
open,  a  great  part  of  his  muscular  legs  appeared  without  cov- 
ering, as  his  stockings  did  not  reach  to  the  knee.  He  was 
placed  upon  the  chair  appropriated  to  witnesses,  and  turned 
at  once  to  the  counsel  for  the  Crown  in  order  to  narrate  his  own 
doings  as  well  as  those  of  his  associates  in  depravity.  I  have 
never  seen  a  cooler,  more  precise,  methodical,  and  consistent 
witness. 

He  detailed  every  circumstance  to  the  minutest  point,  which 
had  happened  during  a  month's  time,  with  a  wonderful  accu- 
racy. So  far  from  manifesting  any  anxiety  to  conceal  or  to 
excuse  his  own  guilt,  he  on  the  contrary  set  it  forth  in  the 
blackest  colors.  He  made  himself  a  prominent  actor  in  the 
business  of  blood.  The  life  which  he  led  was  as  singular  as  it 
was  atrocious.  He  spent  his  time  in  committing  outrages  at 
night,  and  during  the  day  in  exacting  homage  from  the  peas- 
antry, whom  he  had  inspired  with  a  deep  dread  of  him.  He 
walked  through  the  county  in  arms,  and  compelled  every 
peasant  to  give  him  bed  and  board  wherever  he  appeared.  In 
the  caprices  of  his  tyranny,  he  would  make  persons  who 
chanced  to  pass  him,  kneel  down  and  offer  him  reverence, 
while  he  presented  his  musket,  at  their  heads.  Yet  he  was  a 
favorite  with  the  populace,  who  pardoned  the  outrages  com- 
mitted on  themselves,  on  account  of  his  readiness  to  avenge 
the  affronts  or  the  injuries  which  they  suffered  from  others. 
Villain  as  the  fellow  was,  it  was  not  the  reward  which  tempted 


56  CLONMEL   ASSIZES. 

him  to  betray  Lis  associates.  Though  two  thousand  pouncls 
sterling  had  been  offered  by  Government,  he  gave  no  informa- 
tion for  several  months  ;  and  when  he  did  give  it,  it  was  to 
save  his  life,  which  he  had  forfeited  by  a  highway  robbery, 
for  which  he  had  been  arrested.  He  seemed  exceedingly  anx- 
ious to  impress  upon  the  crowd  that,  though  he  was  "  a  stag," 
it  was  not  for  gold  that  he  had  sold  the  cause.  Life  itself  was 
the  only  bribe  that  could  move  his  honor,  and  even  the  tempt- 
ation which  the  instinctive  passion  for  existence  held  out  to 
him  was  for  a  long  while  resisted. 

Mr.  Hatchell  cross-examined  this  formidable  attestator  with 
extraordinary  skill  and  dexterity,  but  he  was  still  unable  to 
shake  his  evidence.  It  was  perfectly  consistent  and  compact, 
smooth  and  round,  without  any  point  of  discrepancy  on  which 
the  most  dexterous  practitioner  could  lay  a  strong  hold.  The 
most  unfavorable  circumstance  to  his  cross-examiner  was  his 
openness  and  candor.  He  had  an  ingenuousness  in  his  atro- 
city which  defied  all  the  ordinary  expedients  of  counsel.  Most 
informers  allege  that  they  are  influenced  by  the  pure  love  of 
justice  to  betray  their  accomplices.  This  statement  goes  to 
shake  their  credit,  because  they  are  manifestly  perjured  in 
the  declaration.  Fitzgerald,  however,  took  a  very  different 
course.  He  disclaimed  all  interest  in  the  cause  of  justice,  and 
repeatedly  stated  that  he  would  not  have  informed,  except  to 
rescue  himself  from  the  halter  which  was  fastened  round  his 
neck.  When  he  left  the  table,  he  impressed  every  man  who 
heard  him  with  a  conviction  of,  not  only  his  great  criminality 
but  his  extraordinary  talents. 

He  was  followed  by  another  accomplice,  of  the  name  of 
Ryan,  who  was  less  remarkable  than  Fitzgerald,  but  whose 
statement  was  equally  consistent,  and  its  parts  as  adhesive  to 
each  other,  as  the  more  important  informers.  They  had  been 
left  in  separate  jails,  and  had  not  had  any  communication,  so 
that  it  could  not  be  suggested  that  their  evidence  was  the  result 
of  a  comparison  of  notes,  and  of  a  conspiracy  against  the  pris- 
oners. This  Hyan  also  alleged  that  he  had  informed  merely 
to  save  his  life. 

These  witnesses  were  succeeded  by  several,  who  deposed  to 


MURDER  OF  DANIEL  MARA.  57 

minute  incidents  which  went  to  corroborate  the  informers ;  but 
notwithstanding  that  a  strong  case  had  been  made  out  by  the 
Crown,  still  the  testimony  of  some  untainted  witness  to  the 
leading  fact  was  requisite,  and  the  counsel  for  the  prosecution 
felt  that  on  Kate  Oostello  the  conviction  must  still  depend. 
She  had  not  taken  any  participation  in  the  murder.  She  could 
not  be  regarded  as  a  member  of  the  conspiracy  ;  she  was  a 
servant  in  the  house  of  old  John  Keogh,  bift  not  an  agent  in 
the  business;  and  if  she  confirmed  what  the  witnesses  had  de- 
posed to,  it  was  obvious  that  a  conviction  would  ensue ;  while, 
upon  the  other  hand,  if  she  was  not  brought  forward,  the  want 
of  her  testimony  would  produce  a  directly  opposite  result. 

She  was  called,  and  a  suspense  far  deeper  than  the  expecta- 
tion which  had  preceded  the  evidence  of  Fitzgerald  was  appa- 
rent in  every  face.  She  did  not  come,  and  was  again  sum- 
moned into  court.  Still  Kate  Oostello  did  not  appear.  Re- 
peated requisitions  were  sent  by  the  Solicitor-General,  but 
without  effect.  At  length,  every  one  began  to  conjecture  that 
she  would  disappoint  and  foil  the  Crown,  and  the  friends  of  the 
prisoners  murmured  that  "  Kate  Costello  would  not  turn  against 
her  people.''  An  obvious  feeling  of  satisfaction  pervaded  the 
crowd,  and  the  prisoners  exhibited  a  proportionate  solicitude, 
in  which  hope  seemed  to  predominate. 

Suddenly,  however,  the  chamber-door  communicating  with 
the  room  where  the  witnesses  were  kept  was  opened,  and  one 
of  the  most  extraordinary  figures  that  ever  appeared  in  that 
strange  theatre,  an  Irish  court  of  justice,  was  produced.  A 
withered,  diminutive  woman,  who  was  unable  to  support  her- 
self, and  whose  feet  gave  way  at  every  step,  into  which  she 
was  impelled  by  her  attendants,  was  seen  entering  the  court, 
and  tottering  toward  the  table.  Her  face  was  covered,  and  it 
was  impossible,  for  some  time  after  she  had  been  placed  on  the 
table,  to  trace  her  features  ;  but  her  hands,  which  were  as  white 
and  clammy  as  a  corpse's,  and  seemed  to  have  undergone  the 
first  process  of  decomposition,  shook  and  shuddered,  and  a  thrill 
ran  through  the  whole  of  her  miserable  and  wornout  frame.  A 
few  minutes  elapsed  before  her  veil  was  removed  ;  and,  when 
it  was,  the  most  ghastly  face  which  I  have  ever  observed  was 

3* 


5S  CLOKMEL  ASSIZES. 

disclosed  !  liei*  eyes  were  quite  closed,  and  the  eyelids 
shrunken  as  if  by  the  touch  of  death.  The  lips  were  like 
ashes,  and  remained  open  and  without  movement.  Her  breath- 
ing was  scarcely  perceptible,  and,  as  her  head  lay  on  her 
shoulder,  her  long  black  hair  fell  dishevelled,  and  added  to 
the  general  character  of  disordered  horror  which  was  expressed, 
in  her  demeanor. 

Now  that  she  was  produced,  she  seemed  little  calculated  to 
be  of  any  use.  Mr.  Doherty  repeatedly  addressed  himself  to 
her,  and  entreated  her  to  answer.  She  seemed  unconscious 
even  of  the  sound  of  his  voice.  At  length,  however,  with  the 
aid  of  water,  which  was  applied  to  her  mouth,  and  thrown  in 
repeated  aspersions  over  her  face,  she  was  in  some  degree  re- 
stored, and  was  able  to  breathe  a  few  words.  An  interval  of 
minutes  elapsed  between  every  question  and  answer.  Her 
voice  was  so  low  as  to  be  scarcely  audible,  and  was  rather  an 
inarticulate  whisper  than  the  utterance  of  any  connected  sen- 
tence. She  was,  with  a  great  deal  to  do,  conducted  by  the  ex- 
aminer through  some  of  the  preliminary  incidents,  and  at  last 
was  brought  to  the  scene  in  the  grove  where  the  murderers 
were  assembled. 

It  remained  that  she  should  recognise  the  prisoners.  Un- 
less this  were  done,  nothing  would  have  been  accomplished. 
The  rod  with  which  culprits  are  identified  was  put  into  her 
hand,  and  she  was  desired  to  stand  up,  to  turn  to  the  dock,  and 
to  declare  whether  she  saw  in  court  any  of  the  men  whom  she 
had  seen  in  the  grove  on  the  day  of  the  murder.  For  a  con- 
siderable time  she  could  not  be  got  to  rise  from  her  seat ;  and 
when  she  did,  and  stood  up  after  a  great  effort  over  herself, 
before  she  had  turned  round,  but  while  the  rod  was  trembling 
in  her  hand,  another  extraordinary  incident  took  place. 

Walsh,  one  of  the  prisoners  at  the  bar,  cried  out  with  the 
most  vehement  gesture  —  "0  God!  you  are  going  to  murder 
me!  I'll  not  stand  hereto  be  murdered,  for  I'm  downright 
murdered,  God  help  me !"  This  cry,  uttered  by  a  man  almost 
frenzied  with  excitation,  drew  the  attention  of  the  whole  court 
to  the  prisoner;  and  the  Judge  inquired  of  him  of  what  he 
complained.     Walsh  then  stated,  with  more  composure,  that  it 


MURDER   OF   DANIEL   MARA.  59 

was  unfair,  while  there  was  nobody  in  the  dock  but  Lacy  and 
himself,  to  desire  Kate  Oostello  to  look  at  him,  for  that  he  was 
marked  out  to  her  where  he  stood.  This  was  a  very  just  ob- 
servation, and  Judge  Moore  immediately  ordered  that  other 
prisoners  should  be  brought  from  the  jail  into  the  dock,  and 
that  Walsh  should  be  shown  to  Kate  Oostello  in  the  midst  of 
a  crowd. 

The  jail  was  at  a  considerable  distance,  and  a  good  deal  of 
time  was  consumed  in  complying  with  the  directions  of  the 
Judge.  Kate  Oostello  sank  down  again  upon  her  chair;  and, 
in  the  interval  before  the  arrival  of  the  other  prisoners,  we  en- 
gaged in  conjectures  as  to  the  likelihood  of  Walsh  being  iden- 
tified. She  had  never  seen  him,  except  at  the  grove,  and  it 
was  possible  that  she  might  not  remember  him.  In  that  event 
his  life  was  safe.  At  last  the  other  prisoners  were  introduced 
into  the  dock.  The  sound  of  their  fetters  as  they  entered  the 
court,  and  the  grounding  of  the  soldiers'  muskets  on  the  pave- 
ment, struck  me. 

It  was  now  four  o'clock  in  the  morning;  the  candles  were 
almost  wasted  to  their  sockets,  and  a  dim  and  uncertain  light 
was  diffused  through  the  court.  Haggardness  sat  upon  the 
spectators,  and  yet  no  weariness  or  exhaustion  appeared.  The 
frightful  interest  of  the  scene  preserved  the  mind  from  fatigue. 
The  dock  was  crowded  with  malefactors,  and,  brought  as  they 
were  in  order  that  guilt  of  all  kinds  should  be  confused  and  blend- 
ed, they  exhibited  a  most  singular  spectacle.  This  assemblage 
of  human  beings  laden  with  chains  was,  perhaps,  more  melan- 
choly from  the  contrast  which  they  presented  between  their 
condition  and  their  aspect.  Even  the  pale  light  which  glim- 
mered through  the  court  did  not  prevent  their  cheeks  from 
looking  ruddy  and  healthful.  They  had  been  awakened  in 
their  lonely  cells  in  order  to  be  produced,  and,  as  they  were 
not  aware  of  the  object  of  arraying  them  together,  there  was 
some  surprise  mixed  with  fear  in  their  looks.  I  could  not  help 
whispering  to  myself  as  I  surveyed  them,  "What  a  noble  and 
fine  race  of  men  are  here,  and  how  much  have  they  to  answer 
for,  who,  by  degrading,  have  demoralized  such  a  people!" 

The  desire  of  Walsh  having  been  complied  with,  the  witness 


60  CLONMEL    ASSIZES. 

was  called  upon  a  second  time  to  place  the  rod  upon  Lis  head. 
She  rose  again,  and  turned  round,  holding  the  fatal  index  in 
her  hand.  There  was  a  deep  silence  through  the  court;  the 
face  of  Walsh  exhibited  the  most  intense  anxiety,  as  the  eyes 
of  Kate  Costello  rested  upon  the  place  where  he  stood.  She 
appeared  at  first  not  to  recognise  him,  and  the  rod  hung  loosely 
in  her  hand.  I  thought,  as  I  saw  her  eyes  traversing  the  as- 
semblage of  malefactors,  that  she  either  did  not  know  him,  or 
would  affect  not  to  remember  him.  At  last,  however,  she 
raised  the  rod,  and  stretched  it  forth  ;  but,  before  it  was  laid 
on  the  devoted  head,  a  female  voice  exclaimed,  "Oh,  Kate!" 
This  cry,  which  issued  from  the  crowd,  and  was  probably  the 
exclamation  of  some  relative  of  the  Keoghs,  whose  destiny  de- 
pended on  that  of  Walsh,  thrilled  the  witness  to  the  core.  She 
felt  the  adjuration  in  the  very  recesses  of  her  being. 

After  a  shudder,  she  collected  herself  again,  and  advanced 
again  toward  the  dock.  She  raised  the  rod  a  second  time,  and, 
having  laid  it  on  the  head  of  Walsh,  who  gave  himself  up  as 
lost  the  moment  it  touched  him,  she  sank  back  into  her  chair. 
The  feeling  which  had  filled  the  heart  of  every  spectator  here 
found  a  vent,  and  a  deep  murmur  was  heard  through  the  whole 
court,  mingled  with  sounds  of  stifled  execration  from  the  mass 
of  the  people  in  the  background.  Lacy  also  was  identified  ; 
and  here  it  may  be  said  that  the  trial  closed.  Walsh,  who, 
while  he  entertained  any  hope,  had  been  almost  convulsed  with 
agitation,  resumed  his  original  composure.  He  took  no  further 
interest  in  the  proceeding,  except  when  his  landlord  gave  him 
a  high  character  for  integrity  and  good  conduct;  and  this  com- 
mendation he  seemed  rather  to  consider  as  a  sort  of  bequest 
which  he  should  leave  to  his  kindred,  than  as  the  means  of  sa- 
ving his  life.  It  is  almost  unnecessary  to  add  that  the  prisoners 
were  found  guilty. 

Kate  Costello,  whose  evidence  was  of  such  importance  to  the 
Crown,  had  acted  as  a  species  of  menial  in  the  house  of  old 
John  Keogh,  but  was  a  near  relation  of  her  master.  It  is  not 
uncommon  among  the  lower  orders  to  introduce  some  depen- 
dent relative  into  the  family,  who  goes  through  offices  of  utility 
which  are  (juite  free  from  degradation,  and  is  at  the  same  time 


THE   MURDER    OF    DANIEL    MARA.  61 

treated,  to  a  great  extent,  as  an  equal.  Kate  Costello  sat 
down  with  old  Jack  Keogh  and  his  sons  at  their  meals,  and 
was  accounted  one  of  themselves.  The  most  implicit  trust  was 
placed  in  her ;  and  on  one  of  the  assassins  observing  that  "  Kate 
Costello  could  hang  them  all,"  another  observed  that  "there 
was  no  fear  of  Kate."  Nor  would  Kate  ever  have  betrayed 
the  men  who  had  placed  their  confidence  in  her,  from  any  mer- 
cenary motives.  Fitzgerald  had  stated  that  she  had  been  at 
"  the  Grove"  in  the  morning  of  the  day  on  which  .the  murder 
was  committed,  and  that  she  could  confirm  his  testimony.  She 
was  in  consequence  arrested,  and  was  told  that  she  should  be 
hanged  unless  she  disclosed  the  truth.  Terror  extorted  from 
her  the  revealments  which  were  turned  to  such  account.  When 
examined  as  a  witness  on  the  trial  of  Lacy  and  Walsh,  her 
agitation  did  not  arise  from  any  regard  for  them,  but  from  her 
consciousness  that  if  they  were  convicted  her  own  relatives 
and  benefactors  must  share  in  their  fate. 

The  trial  of  Patrick  and  John  Keogh  came  on  upon  Satur- 
day, the  5th  of  April,  some  days  after  the  conviction  of  Lacy 
and  of  Walsh,  who  had  been  executed  in  the  interval.  The 
trial  of  the  Keoghs  had  been  postponed  at  the  instance  of  the 
prisoners,  but  it  was  understood  that  the  Crown  had  no  objec- 
tion to  the  delay,  as  great  difficulty  was  supposed  to  have 
arisen  in  persuading  Kate  Costello  to  give  completion  to  the 
useful  work  in  which  she  had  been  engaged.  It  was  said  that 
the  friends  of  the  Keoghs  had  got  access  to  her,  and  that  she 
had  refused  to  come  forward  against  "  her  people."  It  was 
also  rumored  that  she  had  entertained  an  attachment  for  John 
Keogh,  and  although  he  had  wronged  her,  and  she  had  suffered 
severe  detriment  from  their  criminal  connection,  that  she  loved 
him  still,  and  would  not  take  his  life  away.  There  was,  there- 
fore, enough  of  doubt  incidental  to  the  trial  of  the  Keoghs  to 
give  it  the  interest  of  uncertainty ;  and,  however  fatal  the 
omen  which  the  conviction  of  their  brother-conspirators  held 
out,  still  it  was  supposed  that  Kate  Costello  would  recoil  from 
her  terrible  task. 

The  court  was  as  much  crowded  as  it  had  been  on  the  first 
trial,  upon  the  morning  on  which  the  two  Keoghs  were  put  at 


62  CLONMEL    ASSIZES. 

the  bar.  They  were  more  immediate  agents  in  the  assassina 
tion.  It  had  been  in  a  great  measure  planned,  as  well  as  exe- 
cuted by  them  ;  and  there  was  a  further  circumstance  of  aggra- 
vation in  their  having  been  in  habits  of  intimacy  with  the  de- 
ceased. When  placed  at  the  bar,  their  appearance  struck 
every  spectator  as  in  strange  anomaly  with  their  misdeeds. 
They  both  seemed  to  be  farmers  of  the  most  respectable  class. 
Patrick,  the  younger,  was  perfectly  well  clad.  He  had  a  blue 
coat  and  white  waistcoat,  of  the  best  materials  used  by  the 
peasantry  :  a  black  silk-handkerchief  was  carefully  knotted  on 
his  neck.  He  was  lower  in  stature  and  of  less  athletic  propor- 
tions than  his  brother  John,  but  had  a  more  determined  and 
resolute  physiognomy.  He  looked  alert,  quick,  and  active. 
The  other  was  of  gigantic  stature,  and  of  immense  width  of 
shoulder  and  strength  of  limb.  He  rose  beyond  every  man  in 
court,  and  towered  in  the  dock.  His  dress  was  not  as  neatly 
arranged  as  his  brother's,  and  his  neck  was  without  covering, 
which  served  to  exhibit  the  hugeness  of  his  proportions.  He 
looked  in  the  vigor  of  powerful  manhood.  His  face  was  ruddy 
and  blooming,  and  was  quite  destitute  of  all  darkness  and  ma- 
levolence of  expression.  There  was  perhaps  too  much  fullness 
about  the  lips,  and  some  traces  of  savageness  as  well  as  of 
voluptuousness  might  have  been  detected  by  a  minute  physi- 
ognomist in  their  exuberance;  but  the  bright  blue  of  his  mild 
and  intelligent  eyes  counterbalanced  this  evil  indication. 

The  aspect  of  these  two  young  men  was  greatly  calculated 
to  excite  interest ;  but  there  was  another  object  in  court  which 
was  even  more  deserving  of  attention.  On  the  left  hand  of  his 
two  sons,  and  just  near  the  youngest  of  them,  sat  an  old  man, 
whose  head  was  covered  with  a  profusion  of  gray  hairs,  and  who, 
although  evidently  greatly  advanced  in  years,  was  of  a  hale  and 
healthful  aspect.  I  did  not  notice  him  at  first,  but  in  the  course 
of  the  trial,  the  glare  which  his  eye  gradually  acquired,  and 
the  passing  of  all  color  from  his  cheek,  as  the  fate  of  his  sons 
grew  to  certainty,  drew  my  observation,  and  I  learned  on  in- 
quiry, what  I  had  readily  conjectured,  that  he  was  the  father 
of  the  prisoners  at  the  bar.  He  did  not  utter  a  word  during 
fifteen  or  sixteen  hours  that  he  remained  in  attendance 


THE   MURDER   OF   DANIEL   MARA.  63 

upon  the  dreadful  scene  which  was  going  on  before  him.  The 
appearance  of  Kate  Oostello  herself,  whom  he  had  fostered, 
fed,  and  cherished,  scarcely  seemed  to  move  him  from  his  ter- 
rible tranquillity. 

She  was,  as  on  the  former  occasion,  the  pivot  of  the  whole 
case.  The  anticipations  that  she  would  not  give  evidence 
"  against  her  own  flesh  and  blood"  were  wholly  groundless, 
for  on  her  second  exhibition  as  a  witness  she  enacted  her  part 
with  much  more  firmness  and  determination.  She  had  before 
kept  her  eyes  almost  closed,  but  she  now  opened  and  fixed 
them  upon  the  counsel,  and  exhibited  great  quickness  and 
shrewdness  in  their  expression,  and  watched  the  cross-exami- 
nation with  great  wariness  and  dexterity.  I  was  greatly  sur- 
prised at  this  change,  and  can  only  refer  it  to  the  spirit  of  de- 
termination which  her  passage  of  the  first  difficulty  on  the  for- 
mer trial  had  produced.  The  first  step  in  blood  had  been 
taken,  and  she  trod  more  firmly  in  taking  the  second.  What- 
ever may  have  been  the  cause,  she  certainly  exhibited  little 
compunction  in  bringing  her  cousins  to  justice,  and  laid  the 
rod  on  the  head  of  her  relative  and  supposed  paramour  without 
remorse. 

At  an  early  hour  on  Sunday  morning  the  verdict  of  guilty 
was  brought  in.  The  prisoners  at  the  bar  received  it  without 
surprise,  but  turned  deadly  pale.  The  change  in  John  Keogh 
was  more  manifest,  as  in  the  morning  of  Saturday  he  stood 
blooming  with  health  at  the  bar,  and  was  now  as  white  as  a 
shroud.  The  Judge  told  them  that  as  it  was  the  morning  of 
Easter  Sunday  (which  is  commemorative  of  the  resurrection  of 
the  dead),  he  should  not  then  pronounce  sentence  upon  them. 
They  cried  out,  "A  long  day,  a  long  day,  my  Lord  !"  and  at 
the  same  time  begged  that  their  bodies  might  be  given  to  their 
father.  This  prayer  was  uttered  with  a  sound  resembling  the 
wail  of  an  Irish  funeral,  and  accompanied  with  a  most  pathetic 
gesture.  They  both  swung  themselves  with  a  sort  of  oscilla- 
tion up  and  down,  with  their  heads  thrown  back,  striking  their 
hands,  with  the  fingers  half  closed,  against  their  breasts,  in  the 
manner  which  Roman  Catholics  use  in  saying  "  The  Cowjiteor" 
The  reference  which  they  made  to  their  father  drew  my  atten- 


64  CLONMEL    ASSIZES. 

tion  to  the  miserable  old  man.  Two  persons,  friends  of  his, 
had  attended  him  in  court;  and  when  his  sons,  after  having 
been  founl  guilty,  were  about  to  be  removed,  he  was  lifted  on 
the  table,  on  which  he  was  with  difficulty  sustained,  and  was 
brought  near  to  the  dock.  He  wanted  to  embrace  John  Keogh, 
and  stretched  out  his  arms  toward  him.  The  latter,  whose 
manliness  now  forsook  him,  leaned  over  the  iron  spikes  to  his 
full  length,  got  the  old  man  into  his  bosom,  and,  while  his  tears 
ran  down  his  face,  pressed  him  long  and  closely  to  his  heart. 
They  were  at  length  separated,  and  the  sons  were  removed  to 
the  cells  appointed  for  the  condemned. 

The  Judge  left  the  bench,  and  the  court  was  gradually 
cleared.  Still  the  father  of  the  prisoners  remained  between 
his  two  attendants  almost  insensible.  He  was  almost  the  last 
to  depart.  I  followed  him  out.  It  was  a  dark  and  stormy 
night.  The  wind  beat  full  against  the  miserable  wretch,  and 
made  him  totter  as  he  went  along.  His  attendants  were  ad- 
dressing to  him  some  words  of  consolation  connected  with  reli- 
gion (for  these  people  are,  with  all  their  crimes,  not  destitute 
of  religious  impressions),  but  the  old  man  only  answered  them 
with  his  moans.  He  said  nothing  articulate,  but  during  all 
the  way  to  the  obscure  cellar  into  which  they  led  him,  contin- 
ued moaning  as  he  went.  It  was  not,  I  trust,  a  mere  love  of 
excitement,  which  arises  from  the  contemplation  of  scenes  in 
which  the  passions  are  brought  out,  that  made  me  watch  this 
scene  of  human  misery.  I  may  say,  without  affectation,  that 
I  was  (as  who  would  not  have  been  ?)  profoundly  moved  by 
what  I  saw;  and  when  I  beheld  this  forlorn  and  desolate  man 
descend  into  his  wretched  abode,  which  was  lighted  by  a  fee- 
ble candle,  and  saw  him  fall  upon  his  knees  in  helplessness, 
while  his  attendants  gave  way  to  sorrow,  I  could  not  restrain 
my  own  tears. 

The  scenes  of  misery  did  not  stop  here.  Old  John  Russel 
pleaded  guilty.  He  had  two  sons,  lads  of  fifteen  or  sixteen, 
and,  in  the  hope  of  saving  them,  acknowledged  his  crime  at 
the  bar.  '■'  Let  them,"  he  said,  in  the  jail  where  I  saw  him — 
"  let  them  put  me  on  the  trap  if  they  like,  but  let  them  spare 
the  boys." 


ORIGIN    OF   IRISH    CRIME.  65 

But  T  shall  not  proceed  further  in  the  detail  of  these  dread- 
ful incidents.  There  were  many  other  trials  at  the  assizes,  in 
•which  terrible  disclosures  of  barbarity  took  place.  For  three 
weeks  the  two  Judges  were  unremittingly  employed  in  trying 
cases  of  dreadful  atrocity,  and  in  almost  every  instance  the  per- 
petrators of  crimes  the  most  detestable  were  persons  whose  gen- 
eral moral  conduct  stood  in  a  wonderful  contrast  with  their 
isolated  acts  of  depravity.  Almost  every  offence  was  con- 
nected with  the  great  agrarian  organization  which  prevails 
through  the  country. 

It  must  be  acknowledged  that,  terrible  as  the  misdeeds  of 
the  Tipperary  peasantry  must  upon  all  hands  be  admitted  to 
be,  yet,  in  general,  there  was  none  of  the  meanness  and  turpi- 
tude observable  in  their  enormities  which  characterize  the 
crimes  that  are  disclosed  at  an  English  assize.  There  were 
scarcely  any  examples  of  murder  committed  for  mere  gain.  It 
seemed  to  be  a  point  of  honor  with  the  malefactors  to  take 
blood,  and  to  spurn  at  money.  Almost  every  offence  was  com- 
mitted in  carrying  a  system  into  effect,  and  the  victims  who 
were  sacrificed  were  considered  by  their  immolators  as  offered 
up  upon  a  justifiable  principle  of  necessary  extermination. 
These  are  assuredly  important  facts,  and,  after  having  contem- 
plated these  moral  phenomena,  it  becomes  a  duty  to  inquire 
into  the  causes  from  which  these  marvellous  atrocities  derive 
their  origin. 

But  before  I  proceed  to  suggest  what  I  conceive  to  be  the 
sources  of  a  condition  so  disastrous,  it  is  not  inappropriate  to 
inquire  how  long  the  lower  orders  in  Ireland  have  been  habit- 
uated to  these  terrible  practices,  and  to  look  back  to  the  period 
at  which  they  may  be  considered  to  have  had  their  origin.  If 
these  crimes  were  of  a  novel  character,  and  had  a  recent  exist- 
ence, that  circumstance  would  afford  strong  grounds  for  con- 
cluding that  temporary  expedients,  and  the  vigorous  adminis- 
tration of  the  law  applied  to  the  suppression  of  local  and  ephe- 
meral disturbances,  would  be  of  avail.  But  if  we  find  that 
it  is  not  now,  or  within  these  few  years,  that  these  symptoms 
of  demoralization  have  appeared,  it  is  then  reasonable  to  con- 
clude that  there  must  be  some  essential  vice,  some  radical  im- 


66  CLONMEL    ASSIZES. 

perfection  in  the  general  system  by  which  the  country  is  gov 
erned,  and  it  is  necessary  to  ascertain  what  the  extent  and 
root  of  the  evil  is,  before  any  effectual  remedy  can  be  discov- 
ered for  its  cure. 

This  is  a  subject  of  paramount  interest,  and  its  importance 
will  justify  the  writer  of  this  article,  after  a  detail  of  the  ex- 
traordinary incidents  which  he  has  narrated,  in  taking  a  rapid 
retrospect  of  antecedent  events,  of  which  recent  transactions 
may  be  reasonably  accounted  the  perpetuation.  In  doing  so, 
some  coincidence  may  be  found  with  what  the  writer  may  have 
observed  elsewhere,  but  the  fear  of  incurring  the  imputation 
of  either  tediousness  or  self-citation  shall  not  deter,  him  from 
references  to  what  he  conceives  to  be  of  great  and  momentous 
materiality. 

The  first  and  leading  feature  in  the  disturbances  and  atroci- 
ties of  Tipperary  is,  that  they  are  of  an  old  date,  and  have 
been  for  much  more  than  half  a  century  of  uninterrupted  con- 
tinuance. Arthur  Young*  travelled  in  Ireland  in  the  years 
1776, 1777,  and  1778.  His  excellent  book  is  entitled  "A  Tour 
in  Ireland,  with  General  Observations  on  the  Present  State  of 
that  Kingdom."  Although  the  professed  object  of  Arthur 
Young  in  visiting  Ireland  was  to  ascertain  the  condition  of  its 
agriculture,  and  a  great  portion  of  his  work  turns  upon  that 
subject,  yet  he  has  also  investigated  its  political  condition,  and 
pointed  out  what  he  conceived  to  be  the  chief  evils  by  which 
the  country  was  afflicted,  and  the  mode  of  removing  them.  He 
adverts  particularly  to  the  state  of  the  peasantry  in  the  south 

*  Arthur  Young  was  one  of  the  very  few  men  who  studied  Agriculture,  as 
a  science,  in  the  eighteenth  century.  That  he  might  master  it,  he  traversed  the 
British  islands,  and  extended  his  observations  over  France,  Italy,  and  Spain. 
He  was  a  great  experimentalist.  He  published  the  Farmer's  Calendar  and  the 
Annals  of  Agriculture,  both  of  which  were  very  popular,  and  among  his  con- 
tributors was  George  III.,  who  aspired  to  be  considered  a  country  gentleman, 
by  virtue  of  having  a  farm  of  his  own,  at  Windsor.  When  Sir  John  Sinclair 
g-.it  the  Government  to  establish  the  Board  of  Agriculture,  he  obtained  the  sec- 
retaryship for  Mr.  Young,  who  retained  it  until  his  death,  in  1820.  His  Agri- 
cultural tours  in  England,  Ireland,  and  France,  were  full  of  information,  care- 
fully collected  and  impartially  communicated.  His  statements  respecting  the 
fallen  condition  of  Ireland,  and  the  causes  of  her  decadence,  were  startling— 
because,  from  the  writers  character,  their  truth  was  undoubted. —  M. 


WSITEBOYISM.  67 

of  Ireland,  and  it  is  well  worthy  of  remark  that  the  outrages 
which  are  now  in  daily  commission  were  of  exactly  the  same 
character  as  the  atrocities  which  were  perpetrated  by  the  White- 
boys  (as  the  insurgents  were  called)  in  1760. 

"  The  Whiteboys,"  says  Arthur  Young,  in  page  15  of  the 
quarto  edition,  "  began  in  Tipperary.  It  was  a  common  prac- 
tice with  them  to  go  in  parties  about  the  country,  swearing 
many  to  be  true  to  them,  and  forcing  them  to  join  by  menaces, 
which  they  very  often  carried  into  execution.  At  last  they 
set  up  to  be  general  redressers  of  grievances  —  punished  all 
obnoxious  persons  who  advanced  the  value  of  lands,  or  held 
farms  over  their  head  ;  and,  having  taken  the  administration 
of  justice  into  their  own  hands,  were  not  very  exact  in  the 
distribution  of  it.  They  forced  masters  to  release  apprentices  ; 
carried  off  the  daughters  of  rich  farmers  —  ravished  them  into 
marriages ;  they  levied  sums  of  money  on  the  middling  and 
lower  farmers,  in  order  to  support  their  cause,  in  defending 
prosecutions  against  them ;  and  many  of  them  subsisted  with- 
out work,  supported  by  these  prosecutions.  Sometimes  they 
committed  considerable  robberies,  breaking  into  houses  am 
taking  money  under  pretence  of  redressing  grievances.  In  the 
course  of  these  outrages  they  burnt  several  houses,  and  de- 
stroyed the  whole  substance  of  those  obnoxious  to  them.  The 
barbarities  they  committed  were  shocking.  One  of  their  usual 
punishments,  and  by  no  means  the  most  severe,  was  taking 
people  out  of  their  beds,  carrying  them  naked  in  winter  on  horse- 
back for  some  distance,  and  burying  them  up  to  their  chin  in 
a  hole  with  briers,  not  forgetting  to  cut  off  one  of  their  ears." 
Arthur  Young  goes  on  to  say  that  the  Government  had  not  suc- 
ceeded in  discovering  any  radical  cure. 

It  will  scarcely  be  disputed  that  the  Whiteboyism  of  17G0 
corresponds  with  that  of  1828 ;  and  if,  when  Arthur  Young 
wrote  his  valuable  book,  the  Government  had  not  discovered 
any  "  radical  cure,"  it  will  scarcely  be  suggested  that  any 
remedy  has  since  that  time  been  devised.  From  the  period  at 
which  these  outrages  commenced,  the  evil  has  continued  in  a 
rapidly-progressive  augmentation.  Every  expedient  which 
legislative   ingenuity  could  invent  has  been  tried.     All  that 


68  CLONMEL   ASSIZES. 

the  terrors  of  the  law  could  accomplish  has  been  put  mto  ex- 
periment  without  avail.  Special  commissioners  and  special 
delegations  of  counsel  have  been  almost  annually  despatched 
into  the  disturbed  districts,  and  crime  appears  to  have  only 
undergone  a  pruning,  while  its  roots  remained  untouched. 

Mr.  Doherty  is  not  the  first  Solicitor-General  of  great  abili- 
ties who  has  been  despatched  by  Government  for  the  purpose 
of  awing  the  peasantry  into  their  duty.  The  present  Chief- 
Justice  of  the  King's  Bench  [BusheJ,upon  filling  Mr.  Doherty 's 
office,  was  sent  upon  the  same  painful  errand,  and,  after  having 
been  equally  successful  in  procuring  the  conviction  of  malefac- 
tors, and  brandished  the  naked  sword  of  justice  with  as  puis- 
sant an  arm,  new  atrocities  have  almost  immediately  afterward 
broken  forth,  and  furnished  new  occasions  for  the  exercise  of 
his  commanding  eloquence. 

It  is  reasonable  to  presume  that  the  recent  executions  at 
Olonmel  will  not  be  attended  with  any  more  permanently  use- 
ful consequences;  and  symptoms  are  already  beginning  to  re- 
appear, which,  independently  of  the  admonitions  of  experience, 
may  well  induce  an  apprehension  that,  before  much  time  shall 
go  by,  the  law-officers  of  the  Crown  will  have  to  go  through 
the  same  terrible  routine  of  prosecution.  It  is  said,  indeed,  by 
many  sanguine  speculators  on  the  public  peace,  that  now,  indeed, 
something  effectual  has  been  done,  and  that  the  jail  and  the 
gibbet  there  have  given  a  lesson  that  will  not  be  speedily  for- 
gotten. How  often  has  the  same  thing  been  said  when  the 
scaffold  was  strewed  with  the  same  heaps  of  the  dead  !  How 
often  have  the  prophets  of  tranquillity  been  falsified  by  the 
event !  If  the  crimes  which,  ever  since  the  year  1760,  have 
been  uninterruptedly  committed,  and  have  followed  in  such  a 
rapid  and  tumultuous  succession,  had  been  of  only  occasional 
occurrence,  it  would  be  reasonable  to  conclude  that  the  terrors 
of  the  law  could  repress  them. 

But  it  is  manifest  that  the  system  of  atrocity  doos  not  depend 
upon  causes  merely  ephemeral,  and  can  not  therefore  be  under 
the  operation  of  temporary  checks.  We  have  not  merely  wit- 
nessed sudden  inundations  which,  after  a  rapid  desolation,  have 
suddenly  subsided  :  we  behold  a  stream  as  deep  as  it  is  dark, 


OPERATION  OF  THE  PENAL  CODE.  6D 

which  indicates,  by  its  continuous  current,  that  it  is  derived 
from  an  unfailing  fountain,  and  which,  however  augmented  by 
the  contribution  of  other  springs  of  bitterness,  must  be  indebted 
for  its  main  supply  to  some  abundant  and  distant  source. 
Where,  then,  is  the  well-head  to  be  found  ?  Where  are  we 
to  seek  for  the  origin  of  evils,  which  are  of  such  a  character 
that  they  carry  with  them  the  clearest  evidence  that  their 
causes  must  be  as  enduring  as  themselves?  It  may  at  first 
view,  and  to  any  man  who  is  not  well  acquainted  with  the 
moral  feelings  and  habits  of  the  great  body  of  the  population 
of  Ireland,  seem  a  paradoxical  proposition  that  the  laws  which 
affect  the  Roman  Catholics  furnish  a  clew  by  which,  however 
complicated  the  mazes  may  be  which  constitute  the  labyrinth 
of  calamity,  it  will  not  be  difficult  to  trace  our  way. 

It  may  be  asked,  with  a  great  appearance  of  plausibility 
(and  indeed  it  is  often  inquired),  what  possible  effect  the  ex- 
clusion of  a  few  Roman  Catholic  gentlemen  from  Parliament, 
and  of  still  fewer  Roman  Catholic  barristers  from  the  bench, 
can  produce  in  deteriorating  the  moral  habits  of  the  people  1 
This,  however,  is  not  the  true  view  of  the  matter.  The  exclu- 
sion of  Roman  Catholics  from  office  is  one  of  the  results  of 
the  penal  code,  but  it  is  a  sophism  to  suggest  that  it  is  the  sum 
total  of  the  law  itself,  and  that  the  whole  of  it  might  be  re- 
solved into  that  single  proposition.  The  just  mode  of  present- 
ing the  question  would  be  this:  "What  effect  does  the  penal 
code  produce  by  separating  the  higher  and  the  lower  orders 
from  each  other?" 

Before  I  suggest  any  reasons  of  my  own,  it  may  be  judicious 
to  refer  to  the  same  writer,  from  whom  I  have  extracted  a  de- 
scription of  the  state  of  the  peasantry,  with  which  its  present 
condition  singularly  corresponds.  The  authority  of  Arthur 
Young  is  of  great  value,  because  his  opinions  were  not  in  the 
least  degree  influenced  by  those  passions  which  are  almost  in- 
separable from  every  native  of  Ireland.  He  was  an  English- 
man—  had  no  share  in  the  factious  animosities  by  which  this 
country  is  divided  —  he  had  a  cool,  deliberate,  and  scientific 
mind  —  was  a  sober  thinker,  and  a  deep  scrutinizer  into  the 
frame  and  constitution  of  society,  and  was  entirely  free  from 


TO  CLONMEL   ASStZtiS. 

all  tendency  to  extravagance  in  speculation,  either  political  Of 
religious.  Arthur  Young's  book  consists  of  two  parts.  In  the 
first  he  gives  a  minute  account  of  what  he  saw  in  Ireland,  and 
in  the  second,  under  a  series  of  chapters,  one  of  which  is  ap- 
propriately entitled  "  Oppression,"  he  states  what  he  conceives 
to  be  the  causes  of  the  lamentable  condition  of  the  people. 
Having  prefixed  this  title  of  "  oppression"  to  the  29th  page  of 
the  second  part  of  his  book,  he  says  :  "  The  landlord  of  an 
Irish  estate  inhabited  by  Roman  Catholics,  is  a  sort  of  despot, 
who  yields  obedience  in  whatever  concerns  the  poor  to  no  law 
but  his  own  will.  To  discover  what  the  liberty  of  a  people  is, 
we  must  live  among  them,  and  not  look  for  it  in  the  statutes  of 
the  realm  :  the  language  of  written  law  may  be  that  of  liberty, 
but  the  situation  of  the  poor  may  speak  no  language  but  that 
of  slavery.  There  is  too  much  of  this  contradiction  in  Ireland  ; 
a  long  series  of  oppression,  aided  by  many  very  ill-judged  laws, 
has  brought  landlords  into  a  habit  of  exerting  a  very  lofty  su- 
periority, and  their  vassals  into  that  of  a  most  unlimited  sub- 
mission :  speaking  a  language  that  is  despised,  professing  a 
religion  that  is  abhorred,  and  being  disarmed,  the  poor  find 
themselves,  in  many  cases,  slaves,  even  in  the  bosom  of  written 
liberty  !  .  .  .  The  abominable  distinction  of  religion,  united  with 
the  oppressive  conduct  of  the  little  country-gentlemen,  or  rather 
vermin  of  the  kingdom,  who  were  never  out  of  it,  altogether 
bear  still  very  heavy  on  the  poor  people,  and  subject  them  to 
situations  more  mortifying  than  we  ever  behold  in  England." 
In  the  next  page  after  these  preliminary  observations,  this 
able  writer  (who  said  in  vain  fifty  years  ago  what  since  that 
time  so  many  eminent  men  have  been  in  vain  repeating) 
points  out  more  immediately  the  causes  of  the  crimes  commit- 
ted by  the  peasantry,  which  he  distinctly  refers  to  the  distinc- 
tions of  religion.  "The  proper  distinction  in  all  the  discon- 
tents of  the  people  is  into  Protestant  and  Catholic.  The  White- 
boys,  being  laboring  Catholics,  met  with  all  those  oppressions 
I  have  described,  and  would  probably  have  continued  in  full 
submission,  had  not  very  severe  treatment  blown  up  the  flame 
of  resistance.  The  atrocious  acts  they  were  guilty  of  made 
them  the  objects  of  general  indignation  :  acts  were  passed  for 


JtfSTlOE  TO   IRELAND.  1\ 

tlieir  punishment,  which  seemed  calculated  for  the  meridian  of 
Barbary.  It  is  manifest  that  the  gentlemen  of  Ireland  never 
thought  of  a  radical  cure,  from  overlooking  the  real  cause  of  the 
disease,  which,  in  fact,  lay  in  themselves,  and  not  in  the  wretches 
tliey  doomed  to  the  gallows.  Let  them  change  their  own 
conduct  entirely,  and  the  poor  will  not  long  riot.  Treat  them 
like  men,  who  ought  to  be  free  as  yourselves;  put  an  end  to 
that  system  of  religious  persecution  which  for  seventy  years 
has  divided  the  kingdom  against  itself.  In  these  two  things 
lies  the  cure  of  insurrection  —  perform  them  completely,  and 
you  will  have  an  affectionate  poor,  instead  of  oppressed  and 
discontented  vassals;  a  better  treatment  of  thepoor  in  Ireland 
is  a  very  material  point  to  the  welfare  of  the  whole  British 
empire.  Events  may  happen  which  may  convince  us  fatally 
of  this  truth.  If  not,  oppression  would  have  broken  all  the 
spirit  and  resentment  of  men.  By  what  policy  the  Govern- 
ment of  England  can,  for  so  many  years,  have  permitted  such 
an  absurd  system  to  be  matured  in  Ireland,  is  beyond  the 
power  of  plain  sense  to  discover." 

Arthur  Young  may  be  wrong  in  his  inference  (I  do  not  think 
that  he  is);  but,  be  he  right  or  wrong,  I  have  succeeded  in 
establishing  that  he,  whose  evidence  was  most  dispassionate 
and  impartial,  referred  the  agrarian  barbarities  of  the  lower 
orders  to  the  oppression  of  the  Roman  Catholics.  But  the  pas- 
sage which  I  have  cited  is  not  the  strongest.  The  seventh 
section  of  his  work  is  entitled  "Religion."  After  saying  that 
"  the  domineering  aristocracy  of  five  hundred  thousand  Protest- 
ants feel  the  sweets  of  having  two  millions -of  slaves"  (the  Ro- 
man Catholic  body  was  then  not  one  third  of  what  the  penal 
code  has  since  made  it),  he  observes :  "  The  disturbances  of 
the  Whiteboys,  which  lasted  ten  years"  (what  Avould  he  now 
say  of  their  duration  1),  "  in  spite  of  every  exertion  of  legal 
power,  were,  in  many  circumstances,  very  remarkable,  and  in 
none  more  so  than  in  the  surprising  intelligence  among  the  in- 
surgents, wherever  found.  It  was  universal,  and  almost  in- 
stantaneous. The  numerous  bodies  of  them,  at  whatever  dis- 
tance from  each  other,  seemed  animated  by  one  zeal,  and  not 
a  single  instance  was  known,  in  that  long  course  of  time,  of  a 


72  CLOtfMEL   ASSIZES. 

single  individual  betraying  the  cause.  The  severest  threats 
and  the  most  splendid  promises  of  reward  had  no  other  effect 
than  to  draw  closer  the  bonds  which  cemented  a  multitude  to 
all  appearance  so  desultory.  It  was  then  evident  that  the  iron 
hand  of  oppression  had  been  far  enough  from  securing  the  obe- 
dience or  crushing  the  spirit  of  the  people ;  and  all  reflecting 
men,  who  consider  the  value  of  religious  liberty,  will  wish  it 
may  never  have  that  effect  —  will  trust  in  the  wisdom  of  Al- 
mighty God,  for  teaching  man  to  respect  even  those  prejudices 
of  his  brethren  that  are  imbibed  as  sacred  rights,  even  from 
earliest  infancy  ;  that,  by  dear-bought  experience  of  the  futility 
and  ruin  of  the  attempt,  the  persecuting  spirit  may  cease,  and 
toleration  establish  that  harmony  and  security  which,  five- 
score years'  experience  has  told  us,  is  not  to  be  purchased  at 
the  expense  of  humanity." 

This  is  strong  language,  and  was  used  by  a  man  who  had 
no  connecting  sympathy  of  interest,  of  religion,  or  of  national- 
ity, with  Ireland.  So  unequivocal  an  opinion,  expressed  by  a 
person  of  such  authority,  and  whose  credit  is  not  affected  by 
any  imaginable  circumstance,  must  be  admitted  to  have  great 
weight,  even  if  there  was  a  difficulty  in  perceiving  the  grounds 
on  which  that  opinion  rested.  But  there  is  little  or  none.  The 
law  divides  the  Protestant  proprietor  from  the  Catholic  tiller 
of  the  soil,  and  generates  a  feeling  of  tyrannical  domination 
in  the  one,  and  of  hatred  and  distrust  in  the  other.  The  Irish 
peasant  is  not  divided  from,  his  landlord  by  the  ordinary  de- 
markations  of  society.  Another  barrier  is  erected,  and,  as  if 
the  poor  and  the  rich  were  not  already  sufficiently  separated, 
religion  is  raised  as  an  additional  boundary  between  them. 

The  operation  of  the  feelings,  which  are  the  consequence  of 
this  division,  is  stronger  in  the  county  of  Tipperary  than  else- 
where. It  is  a  peculiarly  Oromwellian  district,  or,  in  other 
words,  the  holy  warriors  of  the  Protector  chose  it  as  their  land 
of  peculiar  promise,  and  selected  it  as  a  favorite  object  of  con- 
fiscation. The  lower  orders  have  good  memories.  There  is 
scarcely  a  peasant  who,  as  he  passes  the  road,  will  not  point  to 
the  splendid  mansions  of  the  aristocracy,  embowered  in  groves, 
Dr  rising  upon  fertile  elevations,  and  tell  you  the  name  of  the 


PROTESTANT   ASCENDENCY.  73 

pious  corporal  or  the  inspired  sergeant  from  whom  the  present 
proprietors  derive  a  title,  which,  even  at  this  day,  appears  to 
be  of  a  modern  origin. 

These  reminiscences  are  of  a  most  injurious  tendency.  But, 
after  all,  it  is  the  system  of  religious  separation  which  nurtures 
the  passions  of  the  peasantry  with  these  pernicious  recollec- 
tions. They  are  not  permitted  to  forget  that  Protestantism  is 
stamped  upon  every  institution  in  the  country,  and  their  own 
sunderance  from  the  privileged  class  is  perpetually  brought  to 
their  minds.  Judges,  sheriffs,  magistrates,  Crown-counsel,  law- 
officers —  all  are  Protestant.*  The  very  sight  of  a  court  of 
justice  reminds  them  of  the  degradations  attached  to  their  re- 
ligion, by  presenting  them  with  the  ocular  proof  of  the  advan- 
tages and  honors  which  belong  to  the  legal  creed.  It  is  not, 
therefore,  wonderful  that  they  should  feel  themselves  a  branded 
caste;  that  they  should  have  a  consciousness  that  they  belong 
to  a  debased  and  inferior  community;  and,  having  no  confi- 
dence in  the  upper  classes,  and  no  reliance  in  the  sectarian 
administration  of  the  law,  that  they  should  establish  a  code  of 
barbarous  legislation  among  themselves,  and  have  recourse  to 
what  Lord  Bacon  calls  "the  wild  justice"  of  revenge.  A 
change  of  system  would  not  perhaps  produce  immediate  ef- 
fects upon  the  character  of  the  people:    but  I  believe  that 

*  Having  repeatedly  mentioned  "  Protestant  Ascendency,"  in  these  notes,  it 
may  not  be  improper  to  define  what  it  was  and  what  it  meant.  In  an  address 
from  the  Corporation  of  Dublin  to  the  Protestants  of  Ireland,  praying  them  to 
resist  Catholic  Emancipation,  the  following  passage  occurs :  "  Protestant  As- 
cendency, which  we  have  resolved  with  our  lives  and  fortunes  to  maintain. 
And  that  no  doubt  may  remain  of  what  we  understand  by  the  words  '  Protestant 
Ascendency,  we  have  further  resolved,  that  we  consider  the  Protestant  Ascen- 
dency to  consist  in  —  a  Protestant  King  of  Ireland  —  a  Protestant  Parliament 
—  a  Protestant  hierarchy  —  Protestant  Electors  and  Government  —  the  benches 
of  justice,  the  army,  and  the  Revenue,  through  all  their  branches  and  details, 
Protestant  —  and  this  system  supported  by  a  connection  with  the  Protestant 
Realm  of  Britain."  Previous  to  this  assertion  of  exclusive  Protestant  rights, 
the  Lord  Chancellor  of  Ireland  had  declared  from  the  judgment-seat  (in  1759) 
that  "  the  laws  did  not  presume  a  Papist  to  exist  in  the  Kingdom,  nor  could 
they  breathe  without  the  connivance  of  government."  Yet  the  Catholics,  whose 
rights  and  very  existence  were  legally  ignored,  were  about  seven  time*  more 
numerous  than  the  Protestants  of  Ireland. —  M. 

Vol.  II.— 4 


?4  CLONMEL   ASSIZES. 

its  results  would  be  much  more  speedy  than  is  generally  im- 
agined. 

At  all  events,  the  experiment  of  conciliation  is  worth  the 
trial.  Every  other  expedient  has  been  resorted  to,  and  has 
wholly  failed.  It  remains  that  the  legislature,  after  exhaust- 
ing all  other  means  of  tranquillizing  Ireland,  should,  upon  a 
mere  chance  of  success,  adopt  the  remedy  which  has  at  least 
the  sanction  of  illustrious  names  for  its  recommendation.  The 
union  of  the  two  great  classes  of  the  people  in  Ireland  —  in 
other  words,  the  emancipation  of  the  Roman  Catholics  —  is  in 
this  view  not  only  recommended  by  motives  of  policy,  but  of 
humanity  ;  for  who  that  has  witnessed  the  scenes  which  I  have 
(perhaps  at  too  much  length)  detailed  in  these  pages,  can  fail 
to  feel  that,  if  the  demoralization  of  the  people  arises  from  bad 
government,  the  men  who  from  feelings  of  partisanship  perse- 
vere in  that  system  of  misrule,  will  have  to  render  a  terrible 
account  1 


THE    CATHOLIC    BAR. 

"  And  ye  shall  walk  in  silk  attire." — Old  Ballad. 

Upon  the  first,  day  of  last  Michaelmas  term  [1826]  eight 
gentlemen  were  called  to  the  Bar,  of  whom  four  were  Roman 
Catholics.  This  was  a  kind  of  event  in  the  Hall  of  the  Four 
Courts,  and  in  the  lack  of  any  other  matter  of  interest,  such 
as  the  speech  of  a  new  Sergeant  at  a  corporation  dinner,  which 
had  by  this  time  ceased  to  excite  the  comments  of  the  attor- 
neys, produced  a  species  of  excitation.  There  are  two  assort- 
ments of  oaths  for  Catholics  and  Protestants  upon  their  admis- 
sion to  the  Bar.  The  latter  still  enter  their  protestations,  in 
the  face  of  Lord  Manners  and  of  Heaven,  against  the  damna- 
ble idolatry  of  the  Church  of  Rome.  But  when  the  more  miti- 
gated oath  provided  for  the  Roman  Catholics  happens  to  be 
rehearsed  on  the  first  day  of  term,*  it  is  easy  to  perceive  an 
expression  of  disrelish  in  the  countenance  of  the  court;  and 
although  it  is  impossible  for  Lord  Manners  to  divest  himself  of 
that  fine  urbanity  which  belongs  to  his  birth  and  rank,  yet  in 
the  bow  with  which  he  receives  the  aspiring  Papist,  there  are 
evident  symptoms  of  constraint;  and  it  is  by  a  kind  of  effort 
even  in  his  features  that  they  are  wrought  into  an  elaborated 
smile. 

It  does  not  frequently  happen  that  more  than  one  or  two 
Roman  Catholics   are  called  in   any  single  term;   and   when 

*  This  sketch  was  published  in  February,  1827,  when  Lord  Manners  was 
Chancellor*— Roman  Catholics  were  not  admitted  to  the  Irish  bar  until  1798. 
— Among  the  earliest  who  availed  themselves  of  this  privilege,  was  Mr.  O'Con- 
nelh— M. 


76  THE   pATHOLIC   BAE. 

Lord  Manners  heard  four  several  shocks  given  to  the  Consti- 
tution, and  the  Roman  Catholic  qualification-oath  coming  again 
and  again  upon  him,  it  is  not  wonderful  that  his  composure 
should  have  been  disturbed,  and  that  the  loyal  part  of  the  Bar 
should  have  caught  the  expression  of  dismay.  Mr.  Sergeant 
Lefroy,  alarmed  at  the  repeated  omissions  of  those  pious  de- 
nunciations of  the  Virgin  Mary,  by  which  the  laws  and  lib- 
erty of  these  countries  are  sustained,  in  the  very  act  of  putting 
a  fee  into  his  pocket,  lifted  up  the  whites  of  his  eyes  to 
Heaven  :  Mr.  Devonshire  Jackson  let  fall  his  mask,  and  deter- 
mined on  voting  for  Gerard  Callaghan  :*  the  Solicitor-General 
was  observed  to  whisper  Mr.  Saurin,  until  the  arrival  of  Mr. 
Plunket  withdrew  him  from  the  ear  of  his  former  associate  in 
office :  to  Mr.  Saurin  it  was  proposed  by  Barclay  Scriven  to 
petition  Mr.  Peel  to  appoint  him  Attorney-General  in  the 
island  of  Barbadoes;  and  it  is  rumored  that  another  letter  to 
my  Lord  Norbury  has  been  discovered,!  in  which  the  writer 
protests  his  belief,  that  the  Bar  will  soon  be  reduced  to  its 
condition  in  the  reign  of  James  the  Second. 

In  the  reign  of  James  the  Second,  Roman  Catholic  barristers 
were  raised  to  office ;  and,  as  the  time  appears  to  be  at  hand 
when  they  will  be  rendered  eligible  by  law  to  hold  places  of 
distinction  and  of  trust,  it  is  worth  our  while  to  examine  in 
what  way  they  conducted  themselves  when,  in  the  short  inter- 
val of  their  political  prosperity,  Roman  Catholics  were  in- 
vested with  authority.  Doctor  King  says,  that  "no  sooner 
had  the  Papists  got  judges  and  juries  that  would  believe 
them,  but  they  began  a  trade  of  swearing  and  ripping  up 
what  they  pretended  their  Protestant  neighbors  had  said  of 
King  James,  whilst  Duke  of  York ;"  and  proceeds  to  charge 
them  with  gross  corruption  in  the  administration  of  justice. 

*  Mr.  Devonshire  Jackson,  a  clever  lawyer,  very  attenuated  in  person  and 
intolerant  in  political  polemics,  is  now  one  of  the  Judges  of  the  Common  Pleas 
in  Ireland. —  Mr.  Gerard  Callaghan,  son  of  Daniel  Callaghan,  a  rich  victualler 
and  contractor  in  Cork,  was  ineligible,  as  a  Catholic,  to  sit  in  Parliament,  so 
he  changed  his  religion,  and  was  elected  for  his  native  city.  After  ^mancipa- 
tion his  brother  Daniel  was  elected,  without  relinquishing  his  religious  faith. —  M- 

t  See  the  preceding-  sketch  of  Lord  Noibury,  in  this  volume. —  M 


AKCHBISHOP    KING.  77 

The  Doctor  was  Archbishop  of  Dublin.  He  had  originally 
been  a  sizar  in  the  University;  and  having  afterward  obtained 
a  fellowship,  gradually  raised  himself,  by  dint  of  sycophancy 
and  intrigue,  to  one  of  the  richest  sees  in  the  richest  establish- 
ment in  the  world.*  Whether  he  exhibited  all  the  arrogance 
of  a  Pontifical  parvenu ;  whether  he  was  at  once  a  haughty 
priest  and  a  consecrated  jackanapes;  whether  he  was  a  sophist 
in  his  creed,  an  equivocator  in  his  statements,  and  a  cobweb- 
weaver  in  his  theology;  whether  he  had  a  vain  head,  a  nig- 
gard hand,  and  a  false  and  servile  heart,  and  betrayed  the 
men  who  raised  him,  I  have  not  been  able  to  determine.  He 
appears  to  have  been  an  apostate  in  his  politics.!  His  represen- 
tation of  the  conduct  of  the  Catholic  judges  in  his  time  is  not 
without  some  episcopal  characteristics,  and  justifies  what  Leslie 
says  of  him  : — "  Though  many  things  the  archbishop  says  are 
true,  yet  he  has  hardly  spoken  a  true  word  without  a  warp." 
The  best  and  most  incontrovertible  evidence  (that  of  Lord 
Clarendon,  the  Lord-Lieutenant,  and  a  firm  Protestant),  could 
be  adduced  to  show  how  widely  the  statements  of  Doctor  King 
vary  from  the  fact. 

Lord  Clarendon  tells  us  that  "  when  the  Popish  judges  went 
to  the  assizes  in  the  counties  of  Down  and  Londonderry,  where 
many  considerable  persons  were  to  be  tried  for  words  formerly 
spoken  against  King  James,  they  took  as  much  pains   as  it 

*  Dr.  William  King-,  born  in  1650,  was  an  Irishman  educated  at  Trinity  Col- 
lege, and  for  many  years  Archbishop  of  Dublin.  It  is  worth  mention,  as  show- 
ing how  church  patronage  went  in  those  days,  and  (it  may  be)  how  little  they 
deserved  promotion,  that  though,  from  1609  to  1773,  there  were  one  hundred 
and  eight  appointments  or  translations  to  Irish  sees,  only  twenty-three  fellows 
of  Trinity  College  (the  only  University  in  Ireland),  were  among  the  prize-hold- 
ers. One  of  these  was  the  illustrious  James  Usher,  appointed  Bishop  of  Meath 
in  1620  (a  see  now  having  Dr.  Singer  at  its  head),  and  Archbishop  of  Armagh 
in  1624.  A  celebrated  wit,  by  the  way,  used  to  say  that  "  Bishops,"  who  are 
always  removed  merely  to  richer  dioceses,  "  are  the  only  things  that  do  not 
suffer  by  translation" — Archbishop  King  died  in  1729. —  M. 

t  Of  these  last  sentences  it  might  be  said,  addressing  Dr.  Magee,  Archbishop 
of  Dublin  when  they  were  written  — 

"  Mutato  nomine,  de  te  fabula  narratur." 
Mr.  Sheil  appears  to  have  a  rooted  antipathy  to  this  divine,  who  was  a  liberal 
in  his  youth,  but  became  intolerant  in  his  later  years. —  M, 


78  THE    CATHOLIC    BAR. 

was  possible  to  quiet  the  minds  of  the  people  wherever  they 
went;  and  they  took  care  to  have  all  the  juries  mingled,  half 
English  and  half  Irish." — (State  Letters,  vol.  i.,  p.  326.)  "  Judge 
Daly,"  he  says,  "  one  of  the  Popish  judges,  did,  at  the  assizes 
of  the  county  of  Meath,  enlarge  much  upon  the  unconsciona- 
bleness  of  indicting  men  for  words  spoken  so  many  years  be- 
fore; and  thereupon  the  jurors,  the  major  part  of  whom  were 
Irish,  acquitted  them:"  and  he  adds,  that  "  Mr.  Justice  Nu- 
gent, another  Popish  judge,  made  the  same  declaration  at 
Drogheda,  where  several  persons  were  tried  for  words."  Lord 
Clarendon  further  states,  that  he  was  in  the  habit  of  consult- 
ing Roman  Catholics,  who  had  been  recently  promoted,  re- 
specting the  appointment  of  mayors,  sheriffs,  and  common- 
council  men.  "  I  advise,"  he  says,  "  with  those  who  are  best 
acquainted  in  these  towns,  particularly  with  Justice  Daly, 
and  others  of  the  King's  council  of  that  persuasion  ;  and  the 
lists  of  names  these  men  give  me,  are  always  equal,  half  Eng- 
glish,  half  Irish,  which,  they  say,  is  the  best  way  to  make 
them  unite  and  live  friendly  together." — (State  Letters,  vol. 
ii.,  p.  319.) 

In  the  first  volume  of  the  State  Letters,  p.  292,  he  says, 
"  At  the  council-board,  there  was  a  complaint  proved  against 
a  justice  of  the  peace  ;  and  it  is  remarkable  that  several  of 
our  new  Roman  Catholic  counsellors,  though  the  justice  was 
an  Englishman  and  a  Protestant,  were  for  putting  off  the  busi- 
ness;  and  particularly  the  three  said  Popish  judges  said,  the 
gentleman  would  be  more  careful  for  the  future."  He  adds, 
that  "  when  the  Popish  judges  were  made  privy-counsellors, 
they  conducted  themselves  with  singular  modesty," — a  prece- 
dent which  I  have  no  doubt  that  Mr.  Blake  will  follow,  when 
he  shall  be  elevated  to  the  vice-regal  cabinet.* 

*  Many  a  chance  arrow  hits  the  white;  many  a  true  word  is  spoket  in  jest; 
Mr.  Sheil  was  an  involuntary  prophet.  Anthony  Richard  Blake,  who  was 
Lord  Wellcsley's  particular  friend,  was  one  of  the  earliest  Catholic  Privy  Coun- 
cillors in  Ireland,  after  Emancipation.  Born  in  1786,  he  was  called  to  the  bar 
in  1813 ;  was  Chief-Remembrancer  of  Ireland  from  1823  to  1842,  when  he 
resigned  from  ill-health ;  in  1844,  was  made  a  commissioner  of  charitable  do- 
nations and  bequests  for  Ireland;  and  died,  in  January,  1849,  aged  sixty- 
three. —  M. 


SIR    THEOBALD    BTTTLER.  Y9 

Of  the  Roman  Catholics,  who  were  promoted  in  the  reign  of 
James  the  Second,  Sir  Theobald  Butler  was  by  far  the  most 
distinguished.  He  was  created  Attorney-General,  and  dis- 
charged the  duties  of  his  office  with  perfect  fairness  and  im- 
partiality. This  very  able,  and,  as  far  as  renown  can  be  ob- 
tained  in  Ireland,  this  celebrated  man  was  not  only  without 
an  equal,  but  without  a  competitor  in  his  profession.  Although 
the  reputation  of  a  lawyer  is  almost  of  necessity  evanescent, 
yet  such  was  the  impression  produced  by  his  extraordinary 
abilities,  that  his  name  is  to  this  day  familiarly  referred  to. 
This  permanence  in  the  national  recollection  is  in  a  great 
measure  to  be  attributed  to  the  very  important  part  which  he 
took  in  politics,  and  especially  in  the  negotiation  of  the  treaty 
of  Limerick.  His  high  rank  also,  for  he  was  a  member  of  the 
great  house  of  Ormond,  added  to  his  influence. 

As  far  as  I  have  been  able  to  form  an  estimate  of  his  intellectual 
qualities,  from  the  speech  which  he  delivered  at  the  bar  of  the 
Irish  House  of  Commons,  he  was  more  remarkable  for  strength, 
brevity,  condensation,  and  great  powers  of  argument,  than  for 
any  extraordinary  faculty  of  elocution.  The  speech  to  which 
I  have  adverted,  has  none  of  those  embellishments  of  rhetoric, 
and  those  splendid  vices  in  oratory,  to  which  the  school  of 
Irish  eloquence  became  subsequently  addicted.*  The  whole 
of  this  oration  is  cast  in  a  syllogistic  mould,  and  exhibits  too 
much  logical  apparatus.  It  was,  I  believe,  the  fashion  of  the 
time  :  still  the  vehemence  of  passion  breaks  through  the  arti- 
ficial regularity  of  reasoning,  and  while  he  is  proceeding  witli 
a  series  of  propositions,  systematically  divided,  the  indignant 
emotions,  which  the  injuries  of  his  country  could  not  fail  to 
produce,  burst  repeatedly  and  abundantly  out :  in  the  midst 
of  all  the  pedantic  forms  of  scholastic  disputation,  Nature  as- 
serts her  dominion ;  he  gives  a  loose  to  anguish,  and  pours 
forth  his  heart. 

Sir  Theobald  Butler  had  not  only  been  among  the  besieged 
Catholics  at  Limerick,  but  was  employed  by  his  countrymen 

*  And  of  which  Mr.  Sheil's  own  oratory  was  a  brilliant  example;  — so  easy 
is  it  to  perceive  faults,  and  yet  possess  them  —  to  approve  of  the  "  meliora,"  and 
yet  have  to  add  "  sed  inferiora  sequor." — M. 


80  THE   CATHOLIC   BAR. 

to  settle  the  articles  of  capitulation.*  His  name  appears  on 
the  face  of  the  treaty  as  one  of  the  parties  with  whom,  on 
behalf  of  the  Irish,  it  was  concluded.  When  in  the  year  1703, 
only  twelve  years  after  the  articles  had  been  signed,  a  bill 
(the  first  link  of  the  penal  code)  was  introduced  into  parlia* 
ment,  the  effect  of  which  was  utterly  to  abrogate  those  articles, 
the  eyes  of  the  whole  nation  were  turned  upon  the  man  who 
had  been  instrumental  in  effecting  that  great  national  arrange- 
ment. Independently  of  his  great  abilities  as  an  advocate,  he 
presented,  in  his  own  person,  a  more  immediate  and  distinct 
perception  of  that  injustice  which  was  about  to  be  exercised 
against  the  body,  of  which  he  was  the  ornament,  and  to  which 
his  eloquence  now  afforded  their  only  refuge. 

In  a  book  entitled  "  An  Account  of  the  Debates  on  the 
Popery  Laws,"  it  is  stated  that  the  Papists  of  Ireland,  obser- 
ving that  the  House  of  Commons  was  preparing  the  heads  of  a 
bill  to  be  transmitted  to  England  to  be  drawn  into  an  act  to 
prevent  the  growth  of  Popery,  and  having  in  vain  endeavored 
to  put  a  stop  to  it  there,  at  its  remittance  back  to  Ireland 
presented  to  the  House  of  Commons  a  petition  praying  to  be 
heard  by  their  counsel  against  the  bill,  and  to  have  a  copy  of 
the  bill,  and  to  have  a  reasonable  time  to  speak  to  it  before  it 
passed,  when  it  was  ordered  that  they  should  be  heard. 

Upon  Tuesday  the  22d  of  February,  1703,  Sir  Theobald 
Butler  appeared  at  the  bar,  and  with  the  treaty  of  Limerick 

*  The  defender  of  Limerick,  when  besieged  by  the  army  of  William  III.,  at 
the  Revolution,  was  "the  gallant  Sarsfield" —  so  designated  in  the  histories  of 
the  time.  He  was  created  Earl  of  Lucan,  by  James  II.,  but  the  title  was  not 
legally  recognised,  for  himself  or  his  descendants,  in  Great  Britain  or  Ireland. 
Limerick  was  surrendered  to  William,  even  while  the  Irish  were  within  a  few 
houi'S  of  assistance  from  France,  upon  conditions,  which,  if  caiTied  out  by  the 
Englisb,  would  have  secured  equal  civil  rights  and  liberties  to  all  of  the  Irish  peo« 
pie,  and  bound  Ireland  to  Great  Britain  by  a  stronger  tie —  that  of  justice  ren- 
dered—  than  that  of"  allegiance."  The  treaty  of  Limerick,  which  terminated 
the  Dutchman's  contest  for  a  throne,  was  basely  violated  by  England,  when  pe- 
nal laws  against  Catholics  were  enacted,  instead  of  the  promised  justice.  To 
this  day,  the  very  stone  on  which  that  Treaty  was  signed,  is  shown  in  Limerick, 
and  one  of  O'Connell's  most  stirring  speeches,  during  the  "  Monster  Meetings" 
of  1843,  was  made  within  sight  of  this  monument  of  Ireland's  having  trusted  to 
the  honor  of  England  —  and  having  been  deceived. — M. 


THE    TREATY    OF   LIMERICK.  81 

in  his  hand,  requested,  on  behalf  of  the  Irish  Roman  Catholics, 
to  be  heard.  It  must  have  been  a  very  remarkable  scene. 
"Whether  we  consider  the  assembly  to  which  the  remonstrance 
was  addressed,  or  the  character  and  condition  of  the  body  on 
whose  behalf  it  was  spoken,  whose  leading  nobles,  and  they 
were  then  numerous,  stood  beside  their  advocate  at  the  bar  of 
the  House,  we  can  not  but  feel  our  minds  impressed  with  a 
vivid  image  of  a  most  imposing,  and  in  some  particulars  a  very 
moving  spectacle.. 

The  first  advocate  of  his  time,  who  was  himself  a  principal 
party  in  the  cause  which  he  came  to  plead,  stood  before  a 
Protestant  House  of  Commons ;  while  below  the  bar  were 
assembled  about  their  counsel  the  heads  of  the  Roman  Catholic 
aristocracy.  The  latter  constituted  a  much  more  extensive 
and  differently-constituted  class  of  men  from  those  by  whom 
they  have  been  succeeded.  They  had  been  born  to  wealth  and 
honor :  they  had  been  induced,  by  a  sentiment  of  chivalrous 
devotion,  to  attach  themselves  to  the  fortunes  of  an  unhappy 
prince.  The  source  of  their  calamities  was  in  a  lofty  senti- 
ment. Almost  all  of  them  had  been  soldiers ;  scarce  a  man  of 
them  but  had  carried  harness  on  his  back.  They  were  actu- 
ated by  the  high  and  gallant  spirit  which  belongs  to  the  pro- 
fession of  arms.  On  the  banks  of  the  Boyne,  on  the  hill  of 
Aughrim,  and  at  the  gates  of  Limerick,  they  had  given  evi- 
dences of  valor,  which,  although  unavailing,  were  not  the  less 
heroic.  They  had  been  worsted,  indeed ;  but  they  had  not 
been  subdued  :  they  had  been  accustomed  to  consider  their 
privileges  as  secured  by  a  great  compact,  and  in  substituting 
the  honor  of  England  for  the  bastions  of  Limerick,  they  looked 
upon  their  liberties  as  protected  by  still  more  impregnable 
muniments. 

It  is  easy  to  imagine  the  dismay,  the  indignation,  and  the 
anguish,  with  which  these  gentlemen  must  have  seen  a  statute 
in  rapid  progress  through  the  legislature,  which  would  not  only 
have  the  effect  of  violating  the  treaty  of  Limerick,  and  reduce 
them  to  a  state  of  utter  servitude,  but,  by  holding  out  the 
estate  of  the  father  as  a  premium  for  the  apostacy  of  the  child, 
Would  inculcate  a  revolt  against  the  first  instincts  of  nature. 


82  THE    CATHOLIC    BAR. 

and  the  most  sacred  ordinances  of  God.  Their  advocate,  at 
least,  saw  the  penal  code  in  this  light.  "  Is  not  this,"  he  ex- 
claimed, "  against  the  laws  of  God  and  man,  against  the  rules 
of  reason  and  justice ;  is  not  this  the  most  effectual  way  in  the 
world  to  make  children  become  undutiful,  and  to  bring  the 
gray  head  of  the  parent  to  the  grave  with  grief  and  tears  V 
In  speaking  thus,  he  did  no  more  than  give  vent  to  the  feelings 
which,  being  himself  a  father,  he  must  have  deeply  experi- 
enced ;  and  the  heart  of  every  parent  whose  cause  he  was 
pleading,  must  have  been  riven  by  their  utterance. 

If  there  was  something  imposing  in  the  sight  of  so  many  of 
the  old  Catholic  nobility  of  Ireland,  of  so  many  gallant  sol- 
diers, gathered  round  their  counsel  in  a  group  of  venerable 
figures  (for  most  of  those  who  had  fought  in  the  civil  wars  were 
now  old),  the  assembly  to  which  they  were  come  to  offer  their 
remonstrances  must  have  also  presented  a  very  striking  spec- 
tacle. The  Irish  House  of  Commons  represented  a  victorious 
and  triumphant  community.  Pride,  haughtiness,  and  disdain, 
the  arrogance  of  conquest,  the  appetite  of  unsatisfied  revenge, 
the  consciousness  of  masterdom,  and  the  determination  to  em- 
ploy it,  must  have  given  this  fierce  and  despotic  convention  a 
very  marked  character.  Most  of  its  members,  as  well  as  their 
Roman  Catholic  supplicants,  had  been  soldiers ;  and  to  the 
gloom  of  Puritanism,  to  which  they  were  still  prone,  they 
united  a  martial  and  overbearing  sternness,  and  exhibited  the 
flush  of  victory  on  their  haughty  and  commanding  aspect.  To 
this  day,  there  are  some  traces  of  lugubrious  peculiarity  in  the 
descendants  of  the  Cromwellian  settlers  in  Ireland  ;  at  the 
period  of  which  I  speak,  the  children  of  the  pious  adventurers 
must  have  exhibited  still  deeper  gloom  of  visage,  and  a  darker 
severity  of  brow. 

In  addressing  an  assembly  so  constituted,  and  in  surveying 
which  an  ordinary  man  would  have  quailed,  Sir  Theobald 
Butler  had  to  perform  a  high  and  arduous  duty.  How  must 
he  have  felt,  when,  advancing  to  the  bar  of  the  House,  he 
threw  his  eyes  around  him,  and  beheld  before  him  the  lurid 
looks  and  baleful  countenances  of  the  Protestant  conquerors 
pf  his  country,  and   saw  beside  him   the   companions   of  big 


StR  THEOBALD   BtTTLElfc.  §3 

youth,  the  associates  of  his  early  life,  many  of  them  his  own 
kindred,  all  of  them  his  fellow-sufferers,  clinging  to  him  as  to 
their  only  stay,  and  substituting  his  talents  for  the  arms  which 
he  had  persuaded  them  to  lay  down  !  The  men  Avhom  he  had 
seen  working  the  cannon  at  the  batteries  of  Limerick  stood 
now,  with  no  other  safeguard  but  his  eloquence,  at  the  mercy  of 
those  whom  they  had  fought  in  the  breach  and  encountered  in 
the  field.  An  orator  of  antiquity  mentions  that  he  never  rose 
to  speak  upon  an  important  occasion  without  a  tremor.  When 
the  advocate  of  a  whole  people  rose  in  the  deep  hush  of  expecta- 
tion, and  in  all  that  thrilling  silence  which  awaits  the  first  words 
of  a  great  public  speaker,  how  must  his  heart  have  throbbed  ! 

Sir  Theobald  Butler's  speech  (I  dwell  thus  long  upon  the 
subject,  because  the  event  which  produced  it  has  been  attended 
with  suclf  important  consequences)  comprehends  almost  every 
reason  which  can  be  pressed  against  the  enactment  of  the 
penal  code,  as  a  violation  of  public  faith.  He  did  not,  how- 
ever, confine  himself  to  mere  reasoning  upon  the  subject,  but 
made  an  attempt  to  touch  the  feelings  of  his  Protestant  audi- 
tors. He  has  drawn  a  strong  and  simple  picture  of  the  domes 
tic  effects  of  the  penal  code  in  the  families  of  Roman  Catholics, 
by  transferring  the  estate  of  the  father  to  his  renegade  son. 
"  That  the  law  should  invest  any  man  with  the  power  of 
depriving  his  fellow-subject  of  his  property  would  be  a  griev- 
ance. But  my  son  —  my  child  —  the  fruit  of  my  body,  whom 
I  have  nursed  in  my  bosom,  and  loved  more  dearly  than  my 
life  —  to  become  my  plunderer,  to  rob  me  of  my  estate,  to  take 
away  my  bread,  to  cut  my  throat  —  it  is  enough  to  make  the 
most  flinty  heart  bleed  to  think  on  it.  For  God's  sake,  gentle- 
men, make  the  case  your  own,"  &c* 

This  adjuration  exhibits  no  art  of  phrase,  but  it  has  nature, 
which,  as  was  observed  by  Dryden  of  Otway's  plays,  is,  after 

*  Extracts  from  Sir  Theobald  Butler's  speech  were  given  about  a  year  ago 
in  the  Eloile  newspaper,  which  in  a  series  of  articles  on  Ireland  contributed  to 
produce  that  calculation  upon  the  freling  of  the  Roman  Catholic  body  recently 
evinced  in  the  debates  of  the  French  parliament.  [The  extracts  referred  to 
were  supplied  to  V Eloile  by  Mr.  Sh  il  himself,  with  other  articles  (many  of 
them  from  his  own  pen),  which  were  translated  into  English,  and  published 
by  the  London  press,  as  indicating  French  opinions  on  Irish  subjects. —  M.] 


84  the  catholic)  &A& 

all,  the  greatest  beauty.  Those  simple  words,  which  contained 
so  much  truth,  can  not  be  read  without  emotion ;  but  how  far 
greater  must  have  been  their  effect  when  uttered  by  a  parent, 
who  was  lifting  up  his  voice  to  protect  the  sanctuaries  of 
nature  against  violation !  In  what  tone  must  a  father  have 
exclaimed,  "  It  would  be  hard  from  any  man  ;  but  from  my 
son,  my  child,  the  fruit  of  my  body,  whom  I  have  nursed  in 
my  bosom  !"  Surely,  in  the  utterance  of  this  appeal  —  not  by 
a  mere  mercenary  artificer  of  passion,  but  b}^  a  man  whom 
everybody  knew  to  be  speaking  the  truth,  and  whose  trembling 
hands  and  quivering  accents  must  have  borne  attestation  to  his 
emotions  —  the  sternest  and  most  resolved  of  his  judges  must 
have  relented,  and,  like  the  evil  spirit  at  the  contemplation  of 
all  the  misery  he  was  about  to  inflict  — 

"  For  a  moment  stood 
Divested  of  his  malice." 

And  if  the  hearts  of  the  Protestant  confiscators  were  touched, 
did  not  the  tears  roll  down  the  faces  of  the  unfortunate  Cath- 
olics who  stood  by  —  did  they  not  turn  to  sob  in  the  bosom  of 
their  children,  and,  clasping  them  in  their  arms,  inquire,  in 
the  dumb  eloquence  of  that  parental  embrace,  "  whether  they 
would  ever  strike  the  poniard,  with  which  the  law  was  about 
to  arm  them,  into  their  breasts?"  Their  advocate  did  not, 
however,  merely  appeal  to  the  sensibilities  of  his  auditors,  but 
swept  his  hand  over  strings  by  which  a  still  deeper  vibration 
must  have  been  produced. 

He  assumed  a  loftier  and  a  bolder  tone.  He  raised  himself 
up  to  the  full  height  of  his  mind,  and,  appealing  to  the  prin- 
ciples of  eternal  truth  and  justice,  denounced  the  vengeance 
of  Heaven  on  those  who  should  be  so  basely  perfidious  as  to 
violate  a  great  and  sacred  compact ;  and  was  sufficiently  cour- 
ageous to  remind  a  Protestant  House  of  Commons  that  the 
treaty  of  Limerick  had  been  signed,  "  when  the  Catholics  had 
swords  in  their  hands."  This  was  a  stirring  sentence,  and 
sent  many  a  heart-thrilling  recollection  into  the  hearts  of  those 
to  whom  it  was  addressed.  The  prince  of  the  conquerors  must 
have  started,  and  the  conquered  must  have  looked  upon  hands  ija 


THE   TREATY    OF   LIMERICK.  85 

which  there  were  swords  no  more.  It  is  recorded  of  an  ancient 
orator,  that  he  exercised  over  the  minds  of  his  heroes  an  influ- 
ence so  powerful,  that  his  description  of  a  battle  was  inter- 
rupted by  the  exclamation  of  a  soldier  who  had  been  present 
at  the  engagement,  and  whom  the  spell  of  eloquence  had  car- 
ried back  to  the  field. 

Even  at  this  day,  every  reference  to  the  siege  of  Limerick 
produces    an    extraordinary    excitation    in    Roman    Catholic 
assemblies;   and  if  tks  descendants  of  those  whose  rights  were 
secured  by  the  treaty  of  Limerick,  recur  with  indignation  to 
the  incidents  of  that  celebrated   siege,  to   Avhat   a  point  of 
excitation  must  the  gallant  cavaliers,  by  whom  the  advocate  of 
the  Irish  nation  was  surrounded,  have  been  wrought,  when  he, 
who  was  himself  a  party  to  that  great  national  indenture,  with 
that  deep  and  solemn  tone  and  that  lofty  gravity  of  demeanor 
for  which  he  was  remarkable,  recalled  the  events  in  which 
almost  every  man  who  heard  him  bore  a  conspicuous  part.     It 
is  in  the  remembrance  of  such  scenes  that  memory  may  be 
justly  called,  "  The  actor  of  our  passions  o'er  again."     I  do  not 
think  that  I  am  guilty  of  any  exaggeration,  when  I  say  that 
in  appealing  to  the  time  when  the  Roman  Catholics  had  arms 
in  their  hands,  the  advocate  of  their  rights  and  the  representa- 
tive of  their  emotions  must  have  brought  back  many  a  martial 
recollection  to  the  clients  in  whose  front  he  stood,  and  whose 
cause  he  was  so  emphatically  pleading.     The  city,  from  which 
William  at  its  first  siege,  with  an  army  of  thirty  thousand  men, 
had  been  driven  back  —  the  fortress,  which  art  and  nature  had 
conspired   to   make   strong,    and    which   valor   and   constancy 
would  have  rendered  impregnable  —  must  have  risen  before 
them.     All  the  glorious  circumstance  incidental  to  their  formei 
occupation  must  have  returned.     The  shout  of  battle,  the  roar 
of  the  cannon,  the  bloody  foss,  the  assault  and  the  repulse, 
the  devotion  and  abandonment,  with  which  whole  regiments 
rushed  through   the   gates,  and   precipitated   themselves   into 
imaginary   martyrdom  —  Sarsfield   upon   the   battlements,   the 
green  flag  floating  from  the  citadel,  and  the  cry  of  "  Help  from 
France!"  —  these   must   have   been    among    the    recollections 
which  were  awakened  by  their  advocate,  while  he  appealed  to 


86  THE   CATHOLIC   SAB. 

the  time  "  when  they  had  arms  in  their  hands,"  and  stood  in 
the  fire  of  their  batteries,  and  not  at  the  threshold  of  the 
House  of  Commons. 

But,  if  the  sentiment  of  martial  pride  was  rekindled  for 
an  instant,  how  quickly  it  must  have  gone  out,  and  how  soon 
those  emotions  must  have  collapsed  into  despair.  They  must 
have  known,  for  the  countenances  of  their  victors  must  have 
apprized  them,  that  they  had  nothing  to  expect  but  servi- 
tude and  all  the  shame  that  follows  it;  and  then,  indeed, 
they  must  have  mourned  over  the  day  when,  at  the  head  of  a 
powerful  army,  in  a  strong  fortification,  with  several  garrison- 
towns  still  in  their  possession,  with  a  great  mass  of  the  popu- 
lation ready  to  rush  again  to  the  field,  and  with  a  French  fleet 
freighted  with  arms  and  with  troops  in  the  Shannon,  they  had 
been  induced,  upon  the  faith  of  a  solemn  compact,  to  lay  down 
their  swords,  and  put  their  trust  in  the  honor  of  the  King  and 
the  integrity  of  his  people.  They  must  have  cursed  the  day, 
when,  instead  of  adding  their  bones  to  the  remains  of  those 
who  lay  slaughtered  in  the  trenches  of  Limerick,  they  survived 
to  behold  the  Protestants  of  Ireland  taking  advantage  of  that 
fatal  surrender,  and  in  defiance  of  the  most  solemn  compacts, 
in  violation  of  a  clear  and  indisputable  treaty,  not  only  ex- 
cluding them  from  the  honors  and  privileges  of  the  state,  but 
wresting  their  property  from  their  hands,  instituting  a  legalized 
banditti  of  "  discoverers,"  exciting  their  children  into  an  insur- 
rection against  human  nature,  converting  filial  ingratitude  into 
a  merit,  and  setting  up  parricide  as  a  newly-invented  virtue,  in 
the  infernal  ethics  of  the  law. 

As  Sir  Theobald  Butler  had  anticipated  (for  he  intimates  it 
in  an  involuntary  expression  of  despondency),  his  arguments 
were  of  little  avail,  and  he  lived  long  enough  to  see  the  penal 
code  carried  to  its  atrocious  perfection,  and  chain  after  chain 
thrown  upon  his  country.  He  even  survived  an  act  of  parlia- 
ment by  which  Roman  Catholics  were  excluded  from  the  pro- 
fession in  which  he  had  earned  fortune  and  renown.  It  is  a 
common  notion  that  he  changed  bis  religion  in  order  to  avert 
the  evils  which  he  so  powerfully  described  ;  but  I  was  informed 
by  his  grandson,  Mr.  Augusune  Butler,  that  he  died  in  the  reli- 


Slit   THEOBALD   BUTLER.  87 

gion  in  which  he  had  lived,*  and  that  his  great  estates  became 
in  consequence  equally  divisible  among  his  children.!  He 
was  interred  in  the  church-yard  of  St.  James's  church,  in  Dub- 
lin, where  a  huge  but  rather  uncouth  monument  has  been 
raised  to  his  memory.  His  epitaph  differs  from  most  obituary 
panegyrics,  by  the  adherence  of  encomium  to  truth.  It  is 
inscribed  under  a  rude  and  now  mutilated  bust,  and  runs  as 
follows :  — 

Designator  hac  effigie 

Theobaldus  e  gente  Butlera 

Hibermis  Jurisconsultus 

Legtim,  Patriae,  nominis  decus 

Dignitate  equestri  donatus,  non  auctus 

Causidicus 

Argutus,  concinnus,  integer 

Barbarie  forensi,  et  vernacula  disertus 

Non  partium  studio 

Non  favoris  aucupio    * 

Non  verborum  lenocinio 

Sed  rerum  pondere 

Et  ingenii  vi  insita 

Et  legum  scientia  penitiori 

Pollens 

Quem  lingua  solers,  illibata  fides 

Comitate  et  sale  multo  condita  gravitas 

Quem  vitae  tenor  sincerus 

Et  recti  custos  animus 

Legum  recondita  depromere  sagax 

Ad  famae  fasti  gium  evexere 

Fortuna?  etiam,  ni  religio  obstai-et,  facile  evexissent. 

Obiit  Septuagenarius  XI  Martii,  1720. 

Notwithstanding  the  exclusion  of  Roman  Catholics  from 
the  Bar,  the  expedient  which  was  adopted  for  the  purpose 
does  not  appear  to  have  been  found  effectual.     A  certificate  of 

*  Sir  Theobold  Butler  died  in  March,  1720,  aged  seventy. —  M. 

t  The  anti-Catholic  Penal  code  enacted,  among  many  other  things,  that  no 
Catholic  heir  could  profit  by  primogeniture,  but  that  the  real  estate  was  equally 
divisible  among  all  the  children,  but  that  if  he  turned  Protestant  he  would  then 
have  the  whole  estate,  even  in  his  father's  lifetime :  if  a  Protestant  went  over 
to  the  Church  of  Rome,  or  procured  another  to  do  so,  it  was  high  treason.  A 
Catholic  wife  was  allowed  an  increase  of  jointure,  on  becoming  a  Protestant. 
A  priest  who  married  a  Catholic  to  a  Protestant,  was  liable  to  be  hanged. —  M. 


88  T&£   CATHOLIC.  £A£. 

conformity  was  all  that  was  required,  and  tins  certificate  was 
so  easily  obtained,  that  the  members  of  the  obnoxious  religion 
were  still  able  to  creep  and  steal  into  the  profession.     The 
letters  of  Primate  Boulter,*  who  governed  Ireland  for  a  con- 
siderable time,  and  whose  simple  maxim  it  was  to  keep  Ire- 
land divided  in  order  that  her  dependency  might  be  secured, 
give  us  a  very  curious  insight  into  the  state  of  the  Irish  Bar  in 
the  year  1727.     In  a  letter  dated  the  7th  of  March,  1727,  he 
writes:  "  There  is  a  bill  gone  over  to  regulate  the  admission 
of  barrister,  attorneys,  six  clerks,  solicitors,  sub-sheriffs,  &c, 
which  is  of  the  last  consequence  to  this  kingdom.     The  prac- 
tice of  the  law,  from  the  top  to  the  bottom,  is  at  present  mostly 
in  the  hands  of  new  converts,  who   give  no  further   security 
on  this  account  than  producing  a  certificate  of  their  having 
received  the  sacrament  in  the  Church  of  England  or  Ireland, 
which  several  of  them,  who  were  Papists  in  London,  obtain  in 
the  road  hither,  and  demand  to  be  admitted  barristers  in  vir- 
tue of  it  at  their  arrival,  and  several  of  them  have  Popish 
wives,  and  have  masses  said  in  their  houses.     Everybody  here 
is  sensible  of  the  terrible  effects  of  this  growing  evil,  and  both 
Lords  and   Commons  are  most  eagerly  desirous  of  this  bill." 
(Boulter's  Letters,  vol.  i.,  p.  179.) 

The  horror  entertained  by  his  Grace  of  Dublin  for  barris- 
ters, whose  better  halves  were  infected  with  Popery,  appears 
ludicrous  at  this  day.  Doctor  King  considered  the  division  of 
allegiance  at  the  Bar,  between  the  law  and  the  fair  sex,  as 
highly  dangerous  to  the  security  of  the  Established  Church, 
and  would  have  taken  "  au  pie  de  la  leltre"  what  Lord  Ches- 
terfield said  of  the  beautiful  Lady  Palmer,t  that  she  was  the 
only  "  dangerous  Papist"  he  had  ever  seen  in  Ireland. 

*  Hugh  Boulter  was  Archbishop  of  Armagh,  Primate  of  Ireland,  and  virtual 
Governor  of  the  country,  during  the  earlier  period  of  the  Hanoverian  dynasty, 
and  is  chiefly  remarkable  for  having  established  schools  for  the  instruction  of 
the  Irish  children ;  which  seminaries  were  eventually  perverted,  by  the  Ascen- 
dency party,  to  purposes  of  proselytism. — Primate  Boulter  died  in  1742. — M. 

t  The  writer  of  this  article  was  acquainted  with  Lady  Palmer,  when  she 
was  upward  of  one  hundred  years  of  age.  The  admiration  which  Lord  Ches- 
terfield is  known  to  have  entertained  for  this  lady  induced  me  to  seek  an  intro- 
duction to  her.     Although  rich,  she  occupied  a  small  lodging  in  Henry  street 


LADY   PALMEIt.  89 

I  know  not,  however,  whether  the  feeling  by  which  Doctor 
King  was  influenced,  be  wholly  extinct.  I  do  not  mean  to  say 
that  Lord  Wellesley  would  object  to  a  barrister  on  account  of 

where  she  lived  secluded  and  alone.  Over  the  chimney-piece  of  the  front 
drawing-room  was  suspended  the  picture  of  her  platonic  idolater.  It  was  a  half- 
length  portrait,  and  had,  I  believe,  been  given  to  her  by  the  man  of  whose 
adoration  she  was  virtuously  vain.  I  was  engaged  in  looking  at  this  picture, 
while  I  waited  on  the  day  of  my  first  introduction  for  this  pristine  beauty  of  the 
Irish  court.  While  I  gazed  upon  the  picture  of  a  man  who  united  so  many 
accomplishments  of  manner  and  of  mind,  and  observed  the  fine  intellectual 
smile,  which  the  painter  had  succeeded  in  stealing  upon  animated  canvass,  I 
fell  into  a  somewhat  imaginative  strain  of  thought,  and  asked  myself  what  sort 
of  woman  "  the  dangerous  Papist"  must  have  been,  in  whom  the  master  of  the 
graces  had  found  such  enchanting  peril.  "  What  a  charm,"  I  said,  "must  she 
have  possessed,  upon  whose  face  and  form  those  bright  eyes  reposed  in  il- 
luminated sweetness, —  how  soft  and  magical  must  have  been  the  voice  from 
whose  whispers  those  lips  have  hung  so  often,  what  gracefulness  of  mind,  what 
an  easy  dignity  of  deportment,  what  elegance  of  movement,  what  sweet  vivacity 
of  expression,  how  much  polished  gayety  and  bewitching  sentiment  must  have 
been  united  1"  I  had  formed  to  myself  an  ideal  image  of  the  young,  the  soft, 
the  fresh,  the  beautiful,  and  tender  girl,  who  had  fascinated  the  magician  of  s(? 
many  spells.  The  picture  was  almost  complete.  The  Castle  in  all  its  quondam 
lustre  rose  before  me,  and  I  almost  saw  my  Loi-d  Chesterfield  conducting  Lady 
Palmer  through  the  movements  of  a  minuet,  when  the  door  was  slowly  opened, 
and  in  the  midst  of  a  volume  of  smoke,  which,  during  my  phantasmagoric  ima- 
ginations, had  not  inappropriately  filled  the  room,  I  beheld  in  her  own  proper 
person  the  being,  in  whose  ideal  creation  I  had  indulged  in  a  sort  of  Pygmalian 
dream.  The  opening  of  the  door  produced  a  rush  of  air,  which  caused  the 
smoke  to  spread  out  in  huge  wreaths  about  her,  and  a  weird  and  withered  form 
stood  in  the  midst  of  the  dispersing  vapor.  She  fixed  upon  me  a  wild  and 
sorceress  eye,  the  expi'ession  of  which  was  aided  by  her  attitude,  her  black  at- 
tire, her  elongated  neck,  her  marked  and  strongly-moulded,  but  emaciated  fea- 
tures. She  leaned  with  her  long  arm  and  her  withered  hand  of  discolored  parch- 
ment upon  an  ivory-headed  cane,  while  she  stretched  forth  her  interrogating 
face,  and  with  a  smile,  not  free  from  ghastliness,  inquired  my  name.  I  men- 
tioned it,  and  her  expression,  as  she  had  been  informed  that  I  was  to  visit  her, 
immediately  changed.  After  the  ordinary  formulas  of  civility,  she  placed  her- 
self in  a  huge  chair,  and  entered  at  once  into  politics.  She  was  a  most  vehe- 
ment Catholic,  and  was  just  the  sort  of  person  that  Sir  Harcourt  Lees  would 
have  ducked  for  a  rebel  and  a  witch.  Lord  Chesterfield  and  the  Catholic 
question  were  the  only  subjects  in  which  she  seemed  to  take  any  interest. 
Upon  the  wrongs  done  to  her  country,  she  spoke  not  only  with  energy,  but  with 
eloquence,  and  with  every  pinch  of  snuff  poured  out  a  sentence  of  sedition. 
"  Steth,  sir,  it  is  not  to  be  borne,"  she  used  to  exclaim,  as  she  lifted  her  figure 
from  the  stoop  of  age,  with  her  eyes  flashing  with  fire,  and  struck  her  cane  vio- 


§0  ?HE    CATHOLIC   £kU. 

his  "having  a  Popish  wife,  and  mass  said  in  his  house ;  hut  it 
is  observable  that,  of  the  three  Catholic  barristers  who  have 
been  promoted  under  his  Lordship's  administration,  by  a 
strange  matrimonial  coincidence  every  one  is  married  to  a 
Protestant. 

The  bill  sent  over  by  Primate  Boulter  was  carried,  and 
Catholics  were  effectually  excluded  from  the  Bar.  From  1725 
to  1793  lawyers  earnestly  and  strenuously  professed  the  doc- 
trines of  the  state  ;  and  although  upon  his  death-bed  many 
an  orator  of  renown  supplicated  in  a  Conn  aught  accent  for  a 
priest,  yet  his  lady,  whose  gentility  of  religion  wals  brought 
into  some  sort  of  question,  and  who  would  have  considered  it 
as  utterly  derogatory  to  set  up  a  widow's  cap  to  the  memory  of 
a  relapsed  papist,  either  drowned  the  agonies  of  conscience  in 
the  vehemence  of  her  sorrows,  or  slapped  the  door  in  the  face 
of  the  intrepid  Jesuit,  who  had  adventured  upon  the  almost 
hopeless  enterprise  of  saving  the  soul  of  the  expiring  counsel- 
lor. The  Bar  gradually  assumed  a  decidedly  Protestant  char- 
acter; and  although  an  occasional  Catholic  practised  as  a 
conveyancer,  yet  none  obtained  any  celebrity  in  the  only 
department  of  the  law  from  which  Roman  Catholics  were  not 
actually  excluded.  Indeed,  they  held  so  low  a  place,  that  it 
appears  to  have  been  a  kind  of  disrepute  to  have  had  anything 
to  do  with  them;  and  I  remember  to  have  read,  in  the  cause 
of  Simpson  against  Lord  Mountmorris,  the  deposition  of  a 
witness,  who  stated  as  a  ground  for  impeaching  a  deed,  exe- 
cuted by  the  Earl  of  Anglesea,  that  it  was  drawn  by  a  Papist. 
Roman    Catholics   were,   at   this   period,    excluded   from    the 

lently  to  the  ground.  Wishing  to  turn  the  conversation  to  more  interesting 
matter,  I  told  her  I  was  not  surprised  at  Lord  Chesterfield  having  called  her  a 
"  dangerous  Papist."  I  had  touched  a  chord,  which,  though  slackened,  was 
not  wholly  unstrung.  The  patriot  relapsed  into  the  woman;  and  passing  at 
once  from  her  former  look  and  attitude,  she  leaned  back  in  her  chair,  and  draw- 
ing her  withered  hands  together,  while  her  arms  fell  loosely  and  languidly  be- 
fore her,  she  looked  up  at  the  picture  of  Lord  Chesterfield  with  a  melancholy 

smile.     "Ah  !"  she  said But  I  have  extended  this  notice  beyond  all 

reasonable  compass.  I  think  it  right  to  add,  after  si  much  mention  of  Lady 
Palmer,  that  although  she  was  vain  of  the  admiration  pf  Lord  Chesterfield,  she 
took  care  never  to  lose  his  esteem,  and  that  her  eputation  was  without  a 
blemish. 


HALF    CONCESSIONS.  91 

English,  as  well  as  from  the  Irish  Bar;  but  Booth,  the  great 
conveyancer,  was  a  Roman  Catholic,  and,  before  the  professors 
of  his  religion  were  admissible  to  the  rank  of  counsel,  Mr. 
Charles  Butler,  of  Lincoln's  Inn,  had  obtained  great  fame. 

In  the  year  1793  the  great  act  for  the  relief  of  the  Roman 
Catholics  was  passed.  It  was  a  piece  of  niggard  and  prepos- 
terous legislation  :  all,  or  nothing,  should  have  been  conceded. 
The  effect  of  a  partial  enfranchisement  was  to  give  the  means 
of  acquiring  wealth,  influence,  intelligence,  and  power,  and  yet 
withhold  the  only  legitimate  means  of  employing  them.  The 
Roman  Catholics  were  not  admitted  into,  but  brought  within 
reach  of  the  constitution.  They  were  still  placed  beyond  the 
state,  and  were  furnished  with  a  lever  to  shake  it.  They 
obtained  that  external  point  d'appui  from  which  they  have 
been  enabled  to  exercise  a  disturbing  power.  The  extension 
of  the  elective  franchise  to  men,  who  were  at  the  same  time 
declared  to  be  ineligible  to  parliament,  and  the  admission  of 
Catholics  to  the  Bar  while  they  were  denied  its  honorable 
reward,  are  conspicuous  instances  of  impolicy. 

The  late  Mr.  George  Ponsonby*  was  strongly  impressed 
with  the  imprudence  of  allowing  Roman  Catholics  to  enter  the 
race  of  intelligence,  and  yet  shut  up  the  goal.  He  felt  that  the 
government  were  disciplining  troops  against  themselves,  and 
insisted  on  the  absurdity  of  exciting  ambition,  and  at  the  same 
time  closing  the  avenues  to  its  legitimate  gratification.  He 
saw  that,  so  far  from  conciliating  the  Roman  Catholic  body  by 
so  imperfect  and  lame  a  measure  of  relief,  their  indignation 
would  rather  be  provoked  by  what  was  refused,  than  their 
gratitude  be  awakened  by  what  was  granted  :  desire  would  be 
inflamed  by  an  approach  to  its  object,  while  it  was  denied  its 
natural  and  tranquillizing  enjoyment.  Mr.  Ponsonby 's  antici- 
pations were  well-founded,  and  are  going  through  a  rapid 
process  of  verification. 

The  first  Roman  Catholics  who  took  advantage  of  the  en- 
nobling statute,  were  Mr.  Donnellan,  Mr.  Mac  Kenna,  Mr. 
Lynch,  and  Mr.  Bellew.     Every  one  of  those  gentlemen  (quod 

*  Lord  Chanceller  of  Ireland  under  "  All  the  Talents"  Ministry  of  1806-7. 
A  brief  memoir  of  him  occurs  in  the  previous  volume. — M. 


92  THE    CATHOLIC   BAR. 

f>ota,  as  Lord  Coke  says  in  Lis  occasional  intimations  to  Junior 
'Par)  was  provided  for  by  Government.  Mr.  Donnellan  ob- 
tained a  place  in  the  rerenue  ;  Mr.  Mac  Kenna  wrote  some 
very  clever  political  tracts,  and  was  silenced  with  a  pension ; 
Mr.  Lynch  married  a  widow  with  a  pension,  which  was 
doubled  after  his  marriage;  and  Mr.  Bellew  is  in  the  receipt 
of  six  hundred  pounds  a  year,  paid  to  him  quarterly  at  the 
Treasury.  The  latter  gentleman  is  deserving  of  notice. 
Whether  I  consider  him  as  an  individual,  as  the  representa- 
tive of  the  old  Catholic  aristocracy  at  the  Bar,  as  a  politician, 
a  religionist,  or  a  pensioner,  I  look  upon  this  able,  upright, 
starch,  solemn,  didactic,  pragmatical,  inflexible,  uncompromi- 
sing, obstinate,  pious,  moral,  good,  benevolent,  high-minded 
and  exceedingly  wrong-headed  person,  as  in  every  way  en- 
titled to  regard. 

Mr.  William  Bellew  is  a  member  of  one  of  the  most  distin- 
guished Roman  Catholic  families  in  Ireland.  There  was 
formerly  a  peerage  attached  to  his  name,  which  was  extin- 
guished in  an  attainder.  A  baronetcy  was  retained.  His 
father,  Sir  Patrick  Bellew,  wras  a  man  of  a  high  spirit,  distin- 
guished for  his  munificence,  and  that  species  of  disastrous 
hospitality,  by  which  many  a  fine  estate  was  so  ingloriously 
dismembered.  He  constituted  a  sort  of  exception  among  the 
Catholic  gentry;  for  at  the  time  when  that  body  sank  under 
the  weight  of  accumulated  indignities,  Sir  Patrick  Bellew  ex- 
hibited a  lofty  sense  of  his  personal  importance,  and  was  suf- 
ficiently bold  to  carry  a  sword.  His  property  descended  to 
his  eldest  son,  Sir  Edward  Bellew.*  Mr.  William  Bellew,  the 
barrister,  who  was  his  second  son,  was  sent  to  the  Anglo-Saxon 
university  of  Douay,  whence  he  returned  with  all  the  alti- 
tude of  demeanor  for  which  his  father  was  remarkable,  but  with 
a  profound  veneration  for  all  constituted  authorities,  of  what- 
ever nature,  kind,  or  degree,  and  with  abstract  tendencies  to 
political  submission,  which  are  by  no  means  at  variance  with 
a  man's  interests  in  Ireland. 

*  Sir  Edward  Bellew,  who  died  in  1827,  was  M.  P.  for,  and  Lord  Lieuten- 
ant of,  the  County  of  Louth.  He  was  succeeded  by  his  son,  the  present  £5jr 
Patrick  Bellew,—  M, 


WILLIAM   BLLLEW.  93 

He  was  one  of  the  first  Roman  Catholics  called  to  the  Bar, 
and  I  have  understood  from  some  of  his  contemporaries,  that,  as 
he  represented  the  Catholic  gentry,  and  was  considered  to 
take  a  decided  lead  in  their  proceedings,  in  his  first  appear- 
ance in  the  Four  Courts  he  attra?ted  much  notice.  His  gen- 
eral bearing  produced  a  sort  of  awe ;  and  it  was  obvious  that, 
as  Owen  Glendower  says,  "  he  was  not  in  the  roll  of  common 
men."  His  lofty  person,  his  stately  walk,  his  perpendicular 
attitude,  the  rectilineal  position  of  his  head,  his  solemnity  of 
gesture,  the  deep  and  meditative  gravity  of  his  expression,  his 
sustained  and  measured  utterance,  the  deliberation  of  his  tones, 
his  self-collectedness  and  concentration,  and  that  condensed, 
but  by  no  means  arrogant  or  overweening,  look  of  superiority 
by  which  he  is  characterized,  fixed  a  universal  gaze  upon 
him ;  and  from  the  contrast  between  him,  and  the  rapid,  bus- 
tling, and  airy  manner  of  most  of  his  brethren,  excited  a 
general  curiosity.  Heedless  of  observation,  and  scarcely  con- 
scious of  it,  the  forensic  aristocrat  passed  through  the  throng 
of  wondering  spectators,  and  as  Horatio  says  of  the  Royal 
Dane, 

"  with  solemn  march 
Went  slow  and  stately  by  them."' 

There  was,  indeed,  something  spectral  in  his  aspect.  The 
phantom  of  the  old  Catholic  aristocracy  seemed  to  have  been 
evoked  in  his  person,  while  the  genius  of  Protestant  ascend- 
ency shrunk  before  its  majestic  apparition.  All  idea  of  check- 
ing "the  growth  of  Popery"  vanished  in  an  instant  at  his 
sight ;  the  only  man  who  could  compete  with  him  in  longitude 
of  dimensions  being  Mr.  Mahaffy ;  but  that  gentleman's  stu- 
pendous length  sat  uneasily  upon  him,  whereas  the  soul  of  the 
lofty  Papist  seemed  to  inhabit  every  department  of  his  frame, 
and  Avould  have  disdained  to  occupy  any  other  than  its  sublime 
and  appropriate  residence.  High  as  his  post  and  demeanor 
were,  they  were  wholly  free  from  affectation.  With  a  great 
deal  of  pride,  he  manifested  neither  insolence  nor  conceit. 
He  looked  far  more  dignified  than  authoritative  ;  and  although 
a  strong  expression  of  austerity  was  inscribed  upon  his  counte- 
nance, it  was  by  no  means  heartless  or  even  severe.     If  J  were 


94  THE   CATHOLIC   BAE. 

a  painter  and  were  employed  to  furnish  illustrations  of  Ivan- 
hoe,  I  do  not  think  that  I  could  find  a  more  appropriate  model 
than  Mr.  Bellew  for  the  picture  of  Lucas  Beaumanoir.  His 
visage  is  inexorable  without  fierceness ;  and  many  a  time  hath 
he  been  observed  fixing  his  immitigable  eye  upon  a  beauty  in 
the  dock  at  the  assizes  of  Dundalk,  with  that  expression  with 
which  the  Grand  Master  is  represented  to  have  surveyed  the 
unfortunate  Jewess.  His  friend  Mr.  Mac  Kenna  used  to  ob- 
serve, that  "  if  William  Bellew  saw  a  man  hanging  from  every 
lamp-post  down  Oapel  street,  in  his  morning  walk  from  Great 
Charles  street  to  the  Four  Courts,  the  only  question  he  would 
asjs,  would  be  whether  they  were  hanged  according  to  law?" 

Mr.  Bellew  came  with  signal  advantages  to  the  Bar.  He 
was  closely  connected  with  the  oldest  and  most  opulent  Roman 
Catholic  families,  and  was  employed  as  their  domestic  counsel. 
Their  wills,  their  purchases,  and  marriage  articles  were  drawn 
under  his  inspection.  It  was,  I  have  heard,  not  a  little  agree- 
able to  behold  Mr.  Bellew  going  through  a  marriage  settle- 
ment, where  an  ancient  Catholic  family  was  to  be  connected 
with  an  inferior  caste.  In  Ireland,  as  well  as  in  the  sister- 
country,  the  pride  of  birth  prevails  among  the  Roman  Catholic 
gentry  beyond  almost  any  other  passion.  As  in  England  we 
find  a  universal  diffusion  of  cousinship  through  the  principal 
Catholic  houses,  so  the  ancient  blood  of  the  Catholics  of  the 
Pale  has  been,  by  a  similar  process  of  intermarriage,  carried 
through  an  almost  uniform  circulation. 

This  pride  of  birth  among  the  Catholic  gentry,  when  ex- 
cluded from  political  distinction,  was  perfectly  natural.  Hav- 
ing no  field  for  the  exercise  of  their  talents,  and  without  any 
prospect  of  obtaining  an  ascent  in  society  through  their  own 
merits,  they  looked  back  to  the  achievements  of  their  ances- 
tors, and  consoled  themselves  with  the  brilliant  retrospect. 
While  a  young  Irish  Protestant  threw  himself  into  the  field  of 
politics,  an  Irish  Catholic  Avas  left  without  the  least  scope  for 
enterprise,  and  had  scarce  any  resource,  but  to  pace  up  and 
down  the  damp  apartments  of  his  family  mansion,  and  to  com- 
mune with  the  high-plumed  warriors  of  the  Pale,  who  frowned 
in  mouldering  paint  before  him,     The  young  ladies  too  were 


WILLIAM    BELLEW.  95 

instructed  to  look  with  emulation  on  the  composed  visages  of 
their  grand  aunts,  and  to  reverence  the  huge  circumference  of 
hoop  in  which  their  more  sacred  symmetries  were  encompassed 
and  concealed. 

For  a  considerable  time,  it  was  possible  to  maintain  the 
dignity  of  the  Iloman  Catholic  families  without  any  plebeian 
intercourse;  but  at  last  the  pressure  of  mortgages  and  judg- 
ments became  too  great,  and  it  was  requisite  to  save  the  estate 
at  the  expense  of  the  purity  of  its  owner's  blood.  After  a 
struggle  and  a  sigh,  the  head  of  an  old  Catholic  house  resigned 
himself  to  the  urgency  of  circumstances,  and  yielded  to  the 
necessity  of  intermingling  the  vulgar  stream,  which  had  crept 
through  the  grocers  and  manufacturers  of  the  Liberty,  with  a 
current  which,  however  pure,  began  to  run  low.  A  priest,  a 
friend  of  the  family  —  who,  as  matrimony  is  one  of  the  seven 
sacraments,  thinks  himself  in  duty  bound  to  promote  so  salu- 
brious a  rite,  is  consulted.  He  gives  a  couple  of  taps  to  his 
gold  snuff-box,  tenders  a  pinch  to  the  old  gentleman ;  protests 
that  there  are  risks  in  celibacy  —  that  it  is  needful  to  husband 
the  constitution  and  the  estate  ;  and,  observing  that  the  young 
squire,  though  a  little  pale,  is  a  pretty  fellow,  puts  his  finger 
to  his  nose,  and  hints  at  a  young  damsel  in  New-Row  (a  peni- 
tent of  his  reverence,  and  a  mighty  good  kind  of  young  woman, 
not  long  come  from  the  Cork  convent),  with  ruddy  cheeks  and 
vigorous  arms,  a  robust  waist  and  antigallican  toes.  The 
parties  are  brought  together.  The  effect  of  juxtaposition  is 
notorious  —  most  of  my  readers  know  it  by  experience.  The 
young  gentleman  stutters  a  compliment ;  the  heart  of  the 
young  lady  and  her  wooden  fan  are  in  a  flutter ;  the  question 
is  popped.  The  old  people  put  their  heads  together.  Con- 
sideration of  the  marriage,  high  blood,  and  equity  of  redemp- 
tion, upon  one  side;  and  rude  health  and  twenty  thousand 
pounds  on  the  other.  The  bargain  is  struck ;  and,  to  insure 
the  hymeneal  negotiation,  nothing  remains  but  that  Counsellor 
Bellew  should  look  over  the  settlements. 

Accordingly  a  Galway  attorney  prepares  the  draft  marriage 
settlement,  with  a  skin  for  every  thousand,  and  waits  on 
Mr.  Beliew.     Laying  thirty  guineas  on  the  tables,  and  think- 


96  THE   CATHOLIC   BAR. 

ing  that  upon  the  credit  of  such  a  fee  he  may  presume  to  offer 
his  opinion,  he  commences  with  an  ejaculation  on  the  fall  of 
the  good  old  families,  until  Mr.  Bellew,  after  counting  the 
money,  casts  a  Oaius  Marius  look  upon  him,  and  awes  him 
into  respect.  He  unrolls  the  volume  of  parchment,  and  the 
eye  of  the  illustrious  conveyancer  glistens  at  the  sight  of  the 
ancient  and  venerable  name  that  stands  at  the  head  of  the 
indenture.  But,  as  he  advances  through  the  labyrinth  of 
limitations,  he  grows  alarmed  and  disturbed  ;  and,  on  arriving 
at  the  words  "  on  the  body  of  the  said  Judy  Mac  Gilligan  to 
be  begotten,"  he  drops  his  pen,  and  puts  the  settlement  away, 
with  something  of  the  look  of  a  Frenchman  when  he  intimates 
his  perception  of  an  unusually  bad  smell.  It  is  only  after  an 
interval  of  reflection,  and  when  he  has  recalled  the  fiscal  phi- 
losophy of  Vespasian,  that  he  is  persuaded  to  resume  his 
labors ;  but  does  not  completely  recover  his  tranquillity  of 
mind  until,  turning  the  back  of  his  brief,  he  marks  that  most 
harmonious  of  all  monosyllables,  "  paid,"  at  the  foot  of  the 
consolatory  stipend. 

No  man  at  the  Bar  is  more  exact,  careful,  technical,  and 
expert,  in  conveyancing,  than  Mr.  Bellew.  He  at  one  time 
monopolized  the  whole  Catholic  business. 

Nor  was  it  to  the  Roman  Catholic  body  that  his  reputation 
as  a  lawyer  was  confined.  He  deservedly  obtained  a  very 
high  character  with  the  whole  public  for  the  extent  of  his 
erudition,  his  familiar  knowledge  of  equity  and  of  the  common 
law,  the  clearness  of  his  statements,  the  ingenuity  and  astute- 
ness of  his  reasoning,  and  for  that  species  of  calm  and  delib- 
erative elocution  which  is  of  such  importance  in  the  Court  of 
Chancery*     I  look  upon  Mr.  Bellew  as  a  man  who  has  most 

*  In  a  book  like  this,  chiefly  devoted  to  legal  subjects,  it  can  not  be  out  of 
place  to  make  a  brief  statement  respecting  the  British  Court  of  Chancery. 
Next  below  the  House  of  Lords,  before  which  come  all  final  appeals  —  the  Chan- 
cery Court  has  jurisdiction.  Originally  established  to  modeiute  the  severity 
and  rectify  the  errors  of  the  other  Courts,  its  proceedings  are  essentially  in 
equity,  though,  at  times,  it  can  act  in  the  capacity  of  a  Court  of  common  law, 
though  it  can  not  summon  a  jury  or  try  facts.  Its  power  has  been  immense 
since  its  establishment,  the  exact  date  of  which  is  not  known,  though  it  is  as- 
certained that  this  Court  had  a  separate  jurisdiction  on  the  reign  of  Edward 


THE    COURT    OF   CHANCERY.  97 

grievously  suffered  by  his  exclusion  from  the  inner  bar,  from 
which  nothing  but  his  religion  could  have  kept  him.  It  was 
in  the  Court  of  Chancery  that  his  business  lay  almost  entirely; 

III.,  and  is  believed  to  have  been  derived  from  the  rule  of  the  Saxon  monarchs, 
when  a  party  who  thought  justice  was  not  rendered  to  him  could  appeal  to  the 
King  in  Council,  for  his  revision  of  the  case,  most  of  which  appeals,  as  they 
grew  numerous,  were  transferred  to  a  subject  "learned  in  the  law" — usually 
an  ecclesiastic,  at  that  time.  This  Court  (amid  other  means  to  defeat  and  pun- 
ish fraud,  oppression,  breaches  of  trust,  and  eveiy  kind  of  injustice)  can  com- 
pel a  defendant  to  discover  facts  which  are  against  his  own  cause.  But  the 
great  evil,  arising  from  increase  and  accumulation  of  business  as  well  as  from 
the  delays  of  judges,  has  been  the  dilatory  nature,  with  the  consequent  expense 
of  the  proceedings  requisite  to  obtain  a  decision.  Under  Lord  Eldon,  who  was 
Lord  Chancellor  for  five-and-twenty  years,  and  who  doubted  upon  the  simplest 
points,  though  his  judgments  were  excellent  when  given,  the  Court  of  Chan- 
cery became  a  crying  evil  instead  of  a  substantial  good.  Expenses  and  delays 
ruined  many  wealthy  persons  who  had  come  before  this  tribunal,  and  it  caused 
many  a  broken  heart,  and  ruined  hope.  In  Lord  Eldon's  time,  owing  to  the 
accumulation  of  business,  the  amount  of  property  litigated  in  Chancery,  was 
eleven  million  pounds  sterling  or  fifty-five  million  dollars.  When  Brougham 
was  in  the  House  of  Commons,  he  repeatedly  and  strongly  contended  for  the 
necessity  of  a  Reform  in  the  Court  of  Chancery.  In  1830,  Brougham  became 
Chancellor.  "  There  is  Brougham,"  said  Sydney  Smith,  "  sworn  in  as  Chan- 
cellor at  noon,  and  laying  on  the  table  of  the  Lords,  at  six  o'clock  the  same 
day,  a  Bill  for  Chancery  Reform."  A  great  deal  was  attempted  in  this  respect 
—  but  the  Lord  Chancellor,  who  is  not  only  a  judge,  but  also  a  political  leader, 
as  one  of  the  Cabinet,  besides  having  to  sit  as  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Lords, 
is  unable  to  do  everything,  unless  he  had  fifty  hands  and  twice  fifty  heads.  The 
separation  of  the  judicial  from  political  labors  of  the  Chancery  has  been  sug- 
gested, and  will  probably  take  place.  Lord  Brougham,  during  the  four  years 
he  presided,  disposed  of  nearly  all  the  arrears  of  his  predecessors,  Eldon  and 
Lyndhurst,  and  cleared  off,  by  prompt  adjudication,  the  cases  which  originated 
in  his  own  time  and  were  ripe  for  decision.  His  successors  (Cottenham,  Lynd- 
hurst, and  Truro),  did  not  follow  in  his  steps ;  ill-health,  pre-occupation  with 
other  matters,  and  disinclination  to  labor  prevented  them.  In  1852,  during 
nine  months  of  which  Lord  St.  Leonards  was  Chancellor,  he  manifested  a  strong 
inclination  to  reform  the  Chancery  system ;  his  successor,  Lord  Cranworth, 
appears  disposed  to  let  matters  rest  as  they  are.  But  there  is  a  vast  improve- 
ment on  the  system  as  it  was  in  Lord  Eldon's  doubtful  era.  In  his  time,  and 
greatly  against  his  consent,  a  Vice-Chancellor  was  appointed,  to  assist  the 
Chancellor  —  there  now  are  three,  besides  two  Lord  Justices  of  Appeal,  while 
a  great  deal  of  equity  business  continues  to  be  done  by  the  Master  of  the  Rolls. 
The  delaying  course  of  referring  cases  to  the  Masters  in  Chancery,  for  inquiry, 
is  in  course  of  change ;  the  number  of  Masters  is  lessened,  and  on  the  judges 
themselves  will  principally  rest  the  immediate  inquiry  into,  and  examination  of 

Vol.  II.— 5 


93  THE    CATHOLIC   BAR. 

and  in  that  Court,  it  is  absolutely  necessary  to  have  a  silk 
gown,  in  order  to  be  listened  to  with  ordinary  attention.  The 
reason  is  this  :  not  that  Lord  Manners  pays  no  respect  to  any 
individual  who  is  not  in  silk  attire,  but  because  the  multitude 
of  King's  Counsel,  who  precede  a  lawyer  in  a  stuff  gown,  of 
necessity  exhaust  the  subject,  and  leave  him  the  lees  and 
dregs  of  the  case.* 

Mr.  Bellew  has  lived  to  see  his  inferiors  in  talent  and  in 
knowledge  raised  above  his  head,  and  it  is  now  his  doom,  at 
the  end  of  a  cause,  to  send  his  arguments  like  spent  shot,  after 
the  real  contest  has  been  decided,  and  the  hot  fire  is  over.  His 
situation  would  be  very  different,  indeed,  if  it  were  his  office 
to  state  cases  and  open  important  motions,  for  which  no  man 
is  more  eminently  qualified.  The  whole  Bar  feel  that  he 
labors  under  a  great  hardship  in  this  particular,  for  which  a 
pension  of  six  hundred  pounds  sterling  a-year  affords  a  very 
inadequate  compensation.  Mr.  Bellew's  pension  of  six  hundred 
pounds  has  effectually  excluded  him  from  all  useful  inter- 
ference in  Roman  Catholic  affairs;  for,  whenever  he  opposes 
a  popular  measure,  it  is  sufficient  to  refer  to  his  salary  at  the 
Castle,  in  order  to  excite  the  popular  feeling  against  him.  He 
has,  however,  upon  this  subject,  been  a  good  deal  misrepre- 
sented, and  it  is  only  an  act  of  justice  to  him  to  state  the  facts. 

The  Catholic  aristocracy  supported  the  Union.  They  were 
led  astray  by  a  promise  from  Lord  Cornwallis,  and  by  such  an 
intimation  from   Pitt   as  induced   him   to   resign.f      I   do  not 

facts.  With  such  "  aids  and  appliances  to  boot,"  it  is  natural  to  expect  that 
in  future,  cases  will  not  be  before  the  Court  for  forty,  thirty,  or  even  twenty 
years :  one  case  was  actually  undecided  after  it  had  been  over  a  centuiy  in  the 
Court.— M. 

*  At  the  Irish,  as  well  as  at  the  English  bar,  no  counsel  is  allowed  to  go  over 
the  same  line  of  argument  taken  by  another.  Therefore,  pre-audience  being 
the  right  of  those  who  have  patents  of  precedency,  or  wear  the  silk  gown  or  the 
coif,  the  junior. in  a  stuff  gown  usually  finds  the  subject  exhausted,  by  previous 
speakers,  before  ho  has  an  opportunity  of  speaking.  Now  and  then,  a  junior 
makr-8  a  hit  by  coming  out  with  points  of  law  or  quoting  cases  neglected  by  his 
seniors  —  but  this  is  rare. —  M. 

t  There  is  no  doubt  that  Pitt,  when  he  intrigued  to  effect  the  Union,  premised 
that  it  should  be  followed  by  Catholic  Emancipation.  When  he  found  that 
George  III.  would  not  allow  him  to  fulfil    this    promise,    Pitt    at    once     re- 


Mb.  bellew.  99 

intend  to  discuss  the  merits  of  the  question,  hut  can  readily 
conceive  that  many  a  good  man  might  have  advocated  the 
measure,  without  earning  for  his  motto,  "  Vendidit  Jiic  auro 
pah'iam"*  I  am  fully  convinced,  from  what  I  know  of  the 
honorable  cast  of  Mr.  Bellew's  mind,  that  he  never  did  pro- 
mote the  measure  from  any  sordid  views  to  his  own  interest. 
Lord  Oastlereagh  was  well  aware  of  the  importance  of  securing 
the  support  of  the  leading  Roman  Catholic  gentry,  and  the  place 
of  assistant-barrister  was  promised  to  Mr.  Bellew.  Whether  the 
promise  was  made  before  or  after  the  Union,  I  am  not  aware; 
nor  is  it  of  consequence  excepting  we  adopt  the  scholastic 
distinction  of  Father  Foigard,  in  his  argumentative  assault 
upon  Cherry's  virtue:  "If  it  be  before,  it  is  a  bribe;  if  it  be 
after,  it  is  only  a  gratification."  At  all  events,  I  am  con- 
vinced that  Mr.  Bellew  did  nothing  at  variance  with  honor 
and  conscience  from  any  mercenary  consideration. 

The  place  of  assistant-barrister  became  vacant:  Lord  Oas- 
tlereagh was  reminded  of  j^is  engagement,  when,  behold  !  a 
petition,  signed  by  the  magistrates  of  the  county  to  which  Mr. 
Bellew  was  about  to  be  nominated,  is  presented  to  the  Lord- 
Lieutenant,  praying  that  a  Roman  Catholic  should  not  be 
appointed  to  any  judicial  office,  and  intimating  their  determina- 

signed —  as  it  was  made,  with  an  impression  on  his  mind,  cunningly  kept  up 
by  the  King,  that  there  would  be  no  obstacle,  on  the  part  of  Royalty,  to  admit- 
ting the  Catholics  within  the  pale  of  the  Constitution. —  Lord  Comwallis,  men- 
tioned in  the  text,  was  Lord  Lieutenant  of  Ireland  during  the  insurrection  of 
1798,  and  went  as  plenipotentiary  to  France,  in  1801,  in  which  capacity  he 
signed  the  treaty  of  Amiens.  His  whole  public  course  was  distinguished.  In 
1770,  he  was  one  of  the  four  young  peers  who  joined  Lord  Camden  in  a  prot- 
est against  the  taxation  of  America,  which  made  Lord  Mansfield  sneeringly 
say,  "Poor  Camden!  he  could  only  get  four  boys  to  support  him" — yet,  as  a 
military  man,  Loi'd  Comwallis  had  a  command  in  the  American  war,  where 
he  concluded  his  operations  by  being  out-generalled  by  Washington,  to  whom 
he  surrendei-ed  himself  and  his  army.  In  1786,  he  went  out  to  India,  as  Gov 
ernoi'-General  and  commander-in-chief,  where  he  distinguished  himself  against 
Tippoo  Saib.  On  his  return,  he  was  made  a  Marquis,  in  1792.  He  was  again 
sent  to  India  in  1804,  where  he  died,  in  1805,  aged  sixty-seven.  He  was  pop- 
ular in  Ireland,  as  well  as  in  India,  having  certainly  exerted  himself  to  check 
the  inhumanity  of  the  triumphant  royalists.  He  had  no  genius,  but  a  great 
deal  of  common  sense  —  which  is  more  rare  and  valuable. —  M. 
*  He  sold  his  country  for  gold. —  M. 


100  THE   CATHOLIC   BAR. 

tion  not  to  act  with  him.  The  government  were  a  good  deal 
embarrassed  by  this  notification  ;  and  in  order  at  once  to  fulfil 
the  spirit  of  their  contract,  and  not  to  give  offence  to  the 
Protestant  magistrates,  a  pension  equivalent  to  the  salary  of  a 
chairman  was  given  to  Mr.  Bellew,  and  he  was  put  in  the 
enjoyment  of  the  fruits  of  the  office,  without  the  labor  of 
cultivation.* 

That  it  was  reprehensible  to  tax  the  people  with  an  addi- 
tional pension  on  the  part  of  the  Irish  government,  out  of  the 
miserable  dread  of  irritating  a  few  Protestant  gentlemen,  can 
not,  I  think,  be  questioned:  and  but  few  persons  will  be  in- 
clined to  attach  any  great  blame  to  Mr.  Bellew  for  having  ac- 
cepted of  this  compensation.  It  would  be  very  idle,  however, 
to  enter  into  any  explanation  upon  these  subjects  with  the 
Roman  Catholic  body,  among  whom  the  very  name  of  pen- 
sioner, connected  as  it  is  with  all  sorts  of  back  door  and  post- 
ern services  at  the  Castle,  carries  a  deep  stigma.  No  matter 
how  well  Mr.  Bellew  may  argue  a  point  at  a  Catholic  assem- 
bly ;  no  matter  how  cogent  and  convincing  his  arguments  may 

*  The  County  judges  in  Ireland,  who  virtually  preside  at  Quarter  Sessions, 
while  they  are  supposed  only  to  advise  the  justices  of  the  peace  who  sit  (ignorant 
of  law)  upon  the  Bench,  are  called  Assistant-Barristers,  an  appellation  which 
by  no  means  indicates  their  position  and  duties.  Richard  Martin,  formerly  of 
the  Irish  and  now  of  the  English  bar  —  a  man  of  great  legal  acumen,  clear  and 
reasoning  eloquence,  ready  wit,  and  vast  personal  weight  —  tells  a  good  an- 
ecdote illustrative  of  this.  Henry  Deane  Freeman,  an  eminent  lawyer,  was 
"Assistant  Barrister"  in  one  of  the  Connaught  counties,  and  went  the  Munster- 
Circuit,  as  a  practising  lawyer.  He  was  prosecuting  a  man  accused  of  robbery, 
who  produced  as  witness  to  his  character,  another  worthy,  instantly  recognised 
by  Mr.  Freeman,  as  an  old  acquaintance.  In  cross-examination  this  man  was 
ashed,  "  Have  not  you  stood  in  the  dock,  as  a  ciiminal  V — The  witness  sulkily 
replied,  "  What's  that  to  you  ?" — Mr.  Freeman  ;  "  You  must  answer  me.  Were 
not  you  tried  in  Galway  for  robbery?"  Witness:  "Well,  if  I  was,  I  didn't 
do  it."  —  Mr.  Freeman:  "  Of  course  not  —  the  number  of  innocent  culprits  is 
immense.  Were  not  you  convicted  and  sent  to  jail  for  six  months?"  —  By 
this  time,  the  witness  had  recognised  his  examiner,  who,  as  Assistant- Barrister 
in  Galway,  had  tried  and  sentenced  him.  Turning  to  the  judge,  with  a  side- 
long look  of  contempt  at  Mr.  Freeman,  he  said,  sotto  voce,  as  if  he  were  confi- 
dentially communicating  valuable  information,  "  My  Lord !  you  must  not  mind 
what  that  fellow  says.  He's  an  imposter.  He  isn't  a  real  banister.  He's 
only  an  .4w-sistant  Barrister,  and  not  worth  your  notice." — M. 


Mii.  bElleW.  101 

be  in  favor  of  a  more  calm  and  moderate  tone  of  proceedings ; 
the  moment  Mr.  O'Connell  lifts  up  his  strong  arm,  and  with 
an  ejaculation  of  integrity  "  thanks  his  God  that  he  is  not  a 
pensioner!"  all  the'Douay  syllogisms  of  Mr.  Bellew  vanish  at 
the  exclamation,  and  yells  and  shouts  assail  the  retainer  of 
government  from  every  side.  Had  he  the  eloquence  of  De- 
mosthenes, the  clinking  of  the  gold  would  be  heard  amid  the 
thunder. 

Yet  I  entertain  no  doubt  that  Mr.  Bellew  has  not,  in  his 
political  conduct,  been  actuated  by  any  mean  and  dishonest 
motive.  T  utterly  dissent  from  him  in  his  views,  principles, 
and  opinions;  brit  I  believe  that  he  is  only  acting  in  confor- 
mity with  impressions  received  at  a  very  early  period,  which 
his  education  and  habits  tended  not  a  little  to  confirm.  His 
first  opinions  were  formed  at  a  period  when  the  Roman  Catho- 
lic aristocracy  was  actuated  by  a  spirit  very  different  from 
that  which  it  has  lately  evinced.  Much  condemnation  has 
been  attached  to  that  body  for  their  want  of  vigor  in  the  con- 
duct of  Catholic  affairs.  But  allowances  ought  to  be  made  for 
them.  The  penal  code  had,  after  a  few  years,  ground  the  gen- 
try almost  to  powder.  They  lived  in  a  state  of  equal  terror 
and  humiliation.  From  their  infancy  they  were  instructed  to 
look  upon  every  Protestant  with  alarm ;  for  it  was  in  the 
power  of  the  meanest  member  of  that  privileged  class  to  file  a 
bill  of  discovery,  and  strip  them  of  their  estates.  At  their 
ordinary  meals,  they  must  have  regarded  their  own  children 
with  awe,  and  felt  that  they  were  at  their  mercy. 

Swift  represents  the  whole  hody  as  little  better  than  hewers 
of  wood  and  drawers  of  water.  The  complication  of  indignities 
to  which  they  were  exposed  must  necessarily  have  generated 
bad  moral  influences;  and  accordingly  we  find  in  their  petitions 
and  remonstrances  a  tone  of  subserviency  at  which  their  de- 
scendants would  blush.  Even  after  the  penal  code  was  re- 
laxed, and  they  were  restored  to  the  rank  of  citizens,  they 
preserved  the  attitude  of  humility  to  which  they  had  been 
accustomed;  and  when  the  load  which  they  had  carried  so 
long  was  taken  off,  they  retained  a  stoop.  At  length,  how- 
ever, they  stand   erect  in   their  country;   and,  with  very  few 


102  THE   CATHOLIC   EAR. 

exceptions,  exhibit  the  same  spirit  as  the  great  mass  of  the 
people. 

Lord  Fingall,  though  prevented  by  his  health  from  taking 
an  active  part  in  public  affairs,  gives  evidence  of  his  assent 
to  the  bold  and  vigorous  course  of  measures  adopted  by  the 
body,  of  which  he  is  the  hereditary  head,  by  the  presence  of 
his  son.  The  latter,  Lord  Killeen,  manifests  as  much  energy 
and  determination,  as  he  does  sound  sense  and  admirable  dis- 
cretion.* Lord  Gormanstown  has  thrown  himself  with  en- 
thusiasm into  the  national  cause,  and  feels  the  injuries  of  his 
country  with  a  deep  and  indignant  sensibility  ;f  and  even  Lord 
Kenmare,  whose  love  of  retirement  excludes  him  from  the 
bustle  of  public  meetings,  lends  to  the  Catholic  Association 
the  authority  of  his  name,  and  shows  that  the  spirit  of  patriot- 
ism has  penetrated  the  deep  woods  of  Killarney,  in  which  his 
lordship  and  his  excellent  lady  (the  sister  of  Mr.  Wilmot  Hor- 
ton)  are  connubially  embowered.J     I  should  not  omit  to  add, 

*  The  late  Earl  of  Fingall  was  the  Catholic  Peer  who,  at  the  Royal  visit  to 
Ireland  in  1821,  was  made  a  Knight  of  St  Patrick  by  George  IV.  In  the  poem 
called  "The  Irish  Avatara,"  in  ridicule  of  the  servility  of  all  ranks  and  creeds  on 
this  occasion,  Byron  asks 

"  Will  thy  yard  of  blue  riband,  poor  Fingall,  recall 
The  fetters  from  millions  of  Catholic  limbs?" 
The  barony  of  Killeen  dates  as  early  as  1181.  The  Earldom  was  created  in 
1628,  and  Lord  Fingall  was  made  a  peer  of  the  United  Kingdom  in  1831.  He 
died  in  July,  1826.  His  son,  Lord  Killeen,  who  is  Lord  Lieutenant  of  Meath, 
represented  that  county  in  1831,  and  took  a  pi-ominent  part  in  politics,  before 
the  Catholic  Relief  Bill  was  passed,  in  1829.  He  is  a  Privy  Counsellor  of  Ire- 
land.—M. 

t  An  ancestor  of  Viscount  Gormanstown  sided  with  James  II.,  in  Ireland, 
and  after  his  death  William's  government  passed  an  outlawry  against  him  for 
high  treason.  The  title  ceased  to  be  legally  recognised,  but  in  August,  1800, 
on  proceedings  taken  in  the  Court  of  King's  Bench,  by  consent  of  the  Crown, 
the  outlawry  was  reversed,  and  Jenico  Preston  received  a  writ  of  summons  as 
a  peer,  and  is  the  twelfth  Viscount.  He  took  part  with  O'Connell  in  the  agi- 
tation preceding  Emancipation. —  M. 

I  The  ancestor  of  the  Earl  of  Kenmare  received  a  peerage  from  James  II. 
which  was  not  recognised,  as  it  was  conferred  after  that  Monarch  had  lost  the 
throne.  In  1800,  the  Earldom  was  created  anew.  In  1841,  Lord  Kenmare 
was  made  a  British  peer.  After  Emancipation,  he  took  little  part  in  politics, 
but  was  a  Catholic  and  a  Whig.     He  died  in  the  autumn  of  1853.     The  Ken- 


MR.    BELLEW.  103 

tliat  Sir-Edward  Bellew  and  Ins  son,  who  is  a  young  man  of 
very  considerable  abilities,  and  likely  to  make  a  distinguished 
figure,  displayed  during  the  late  election  for  the  county  of 
Louth  great  public  spirit,  energy,  and  determination. 

But  amid  this  almost  universal  change  in  the  general  tem- 
perature of  the  country,  amid  this  general  ascent  of  the  mer- 
curial spirit  of  the  people,  Mr.  William  Belle w  remains  at 
zero.  Not  the  smallest  influence  is  perceptible  in  the  cold 
rigidity  of  his  opinions.  True  to  the  doctrine  of  non-resist- 
ance, he  brings  up  in  its  support  the  whole  barbarous  array 
of  syllogistic  forms  with  which  his  recollections  of  Douay  can 
supply  him.  It  is  in  vain  that  the  rapid  progress  of  the  Cath- 
olic cause  is  urged  against  him  :  you  appeal  in  vain  to  the 
firmness,  union,  and  organization  of  the  people,  which  have 
been  effected  through  the  Catholic  Association  :  the  insurrection 
of  the  peasantry  against  their  landlords,  and  the  consequent 
sense  of  their  own  rights  with  which  they  have  begun  to  be 
impressed,  are  treated  with  utter  scorn  by  this  able  dialecti- 
cian, who  meets  you  at  every  step  with  his  major  drawn  from 
religion,  and  his  minor  derived  from  passive  obedience,  and 
disperses  your  harangue  with  his  peremptory  conclusion.  Nor 
is  it  to  speculation  that  he  confines  his  innate  reverence 
for  the  powers  that  be;  for  after  the  dissolution  of  the  old 
Roman  Catholic  Association  by  an  act  of  Parliament,  when 
an  effort  was  making  to  raise  another  body  out  of  its  ruins,  of 
his  own  accord  Mr.  Bellew  gratuitously  published  a  letter,  in 
the  public  journals,  to  demonstrate  to  the  Attorney-General 
that  it  would  be  legal  to  put  it  down.  In  this  view  Mr.  Plun- 
ket  does  not  appear  to  have  concurred. 

mare  estates  include  some  of  the  finest  parts  of  Killarney  scenery,  and  the  Earl, 
who  was  not  an  absentee,  was  an  excellent  landlord. —  Sir  Robert  Wilmot  Hor- 
ton,  who  assumed  the  latter  name  on  marriage  with  an  heiress  —  a  very  lovely 
woman,  upon  whom  Lord  Byron  wrote  the  lines  commencing 

"  She  walks  in  beauty  —  like  the  light 

Of  cloudless  climes  and  stormy  skies, 

And  all  that's  best  of  dark  and  bright 

Meet  in  her  aspect  and  her  eyes  ;" 
was  an   earnest  advocate  for  Emigration,  went  to   Ceylon   as   Governor,  aiul 
died  in  1841.—  M. 


104  THE    CATHOLIC   BAR. 

Notwithstanding  the  censure  which  I  have  intimated  of  Mr. 
Bellew's  political  tendencies  and  opinions,  I  repeat,  and  that 
sincerely  and  unaffectedly,  that  I  entirely  acquit  him  of  all 
deliberate  corruption.  His  private  life  gives  an  earnest  of  in- 
tegrity which  I  can  not  question.  It  is,  in  all  his  individual 
relations  in  society,  deserving  of  the  most  unqualified  enco- 
mium. It  would  be  a  deviation  from  delicacy,  even  for  the  pur- 
poses of  praise,  to  follow  Mr.  Bellew  through  the  walks  of 
private  life.  Suffice  it  to  say,  that  a  more  generous,  amiable, 
and  tender-hearted  man  is  not  to  be  found  in  his  profession, 
and  underneath  a  frozen  and  somewhat  rugged  surface,  a 
spring  of  deep  and  abundant  goodness  lives  in  his  mind. 

If  in  the  hasty  writing  of  the  present  sketch,  I  have  allowed 
grotesque  images  in  connection  with  Mr.  Bellew  to  pass  across 
my  mind,  I  have  "  set  down  naught  in  malice ;"  and  if  I  have 
ventured  on  a  smile,  that  smile  has  not  been  sardonic.  In 
addition  to  the  other  qualities  of  Mr.  Bellew  for  which  he 
merits  high  praise,  I  should  not  omit  his  sincere  spirit  of  reli- 
gion. He  is  one  of  those  few  who  unite  with  the  creed  of  the 
Pharisee  the  sensibilities  of  the  Samaritan.  Mr.  Bellew  is  a 
devout  and  unostentatious  Roman  Catholic,  deeply  convinced 
of  the  truth  of  his  religion,  and  most  rigorous  in  the  practice 
of  its  precepts.  The  only  requisite  which  he  wants  to  give 
him  a  complete  title  to  spiritual  perfection,  is  one  in  which 
some  of  his  learned  brethren  are  not  deficient;  and  it  can  not 
be  said  that  he  "  has  given  joy  in  heaven,"  upon  the  principle 
on  which  so  many  barristers  have  the  opportunity  of  adminis- 
tering to  the  angelic  transports.  One  of  the  results  of  his 
having  been  always  equally  moral  and  abstemious  as  at  pres- 
ent is,  that  his  dedication  to  religion  attracts  no  notice.  If 
another  barrister  receives  the  sacrament,  it  is  bruited  through 
town  ;  and  at  all  the  Catholic  parties,  the  ladies  describe, 
with  a  pious  minuteness,  the  collected  aspect,  the  combined 
expression  of  penitence  and  humility,  the  clasped  hands,  and 
the  uplifted  eyes  of  the  counsellors ;  while  the  devout  Mr. 
Bellew,  who  goes  through  the  same  sacred  exercise,  passes 
without  a  comment. 

In  truth,  I  should  not  myself  know  that  Mr.  Bellew  was  a 


MR.    BELLEW.  105 

man  of  such  strong  religious  addictions,  but  for  an  incident 
which  put  me  upon  the  inquiry.  Upon  Ash-Wednesday,  it  is 
the  practice  among  pious  Catholics  to  approach  the  altar;  and 
while  he  repeats  in  a  solemn  tone,  "Remember,  man,  that  thou 
art  dust,"  with  the  ashes  which  he  carries  in  a  vase  the  priest 
impresses  the  foreheads  of  those  who  kneel  before  him  with 
the  sign  of  the  cross. 

Some  two  or  three  years  ago,  I  recollect  the  court  was  kept 
waiting  for  Mr.  Bellew,  and  the  Master  of  the  Rolls  began  to 
manifest  some  unusual  symptoms  of  impatience,  when  at  last 
Mr.  Bellew  entered,  having  just  come  from  his  devotions;  and. 
such  was  his  haste  from  chapel,  that  he  had  omitted  to  efface 
the  "memento  ?nori"  from  his  brow.  The  countenance  of  this 
gentleman  is  in  itself  sufficiently  full  of  melancholy  reminis- 
cences ;  but  when  the  Master  of  the  Rolls,  raising  his  eyes 
from  a  notice  which  he  was  diligently  perusing,  looked  him 
full  in  the  face,  he  gave  an  involuntary  start.  The  intimation 
of  judicial  astonishment  directed  the  general  attention  to  the 
advocate ;  and  traced  in  broad  sepulchral  lines,  formed  of 
ashes  of  ebony  in  the  very  centre  of  Mr.  Bellew's  forehead, 
and  surmounted  by  an  ample  and  fully-powdered  wig,  the 
black  and  appalling  emblem.  The  burning  cross  upon  the 
forehead  of  the  sorcerer,  in  "  The  Monk,"  could  not  have  pro- 
duced a  more  awful  effect.  The  Six  Clerks  stood  astonished ; 
the  Registrar  was  petrified ;  the  whiskers  of  Mr.  Daniel 
M'Kay,  the  Irish  Vice-Chancellor,  stood  on  end;  and  while 
Mr.  Driscoll  explained  the  matter  to  Mr.  Sergeant  Lefroy,  Sir 
William  M'Mahon  with  some  abruptness  of  tone  declared  that 
he  would  not  go  beyond  the  motion.* 

*  Sir  William  M'Mahon,  appointed  Master  of  the  Rolls  in  Ireland,  through 
the  influence  of  his  brother,  Sir  John,  Private  Secretary  to  George  IV.  when 
Regent,  was  anything  but  a  lawyer.  Mr.  Sheil's  first  wife  was  Miss  O'Haharon, 
niece  to  Sir  William. —  M. 

9* 


MICHAEL   O'LOGHLIN. 

"  Counsellor  O'Loghlin,  my  motion  is  on,  in  the  Rolls !" 
*  Oh,  Counsellor,  I'm  ruined  for  the  want  of  you  in  the  Com- 
mon Pleas!"  "For  God's  sake,  Counsellor,  step  up  for  a 
moment  to  Master  Townsend's  office  !"  "  Counsellor,  what  will 
I  do  without  you  in  the  King's  Bench  !"  "  Counsellor  O'Logh- 
lin, Mr.  O'Grady  is  carrying  all  before  him  in  the  Court  of 
Exchequer  !"  Such  were  the  simultaneous  exclamations,  which, 
upon  entering  the  Hall  of  the  Four  Courts,  at  the  beginning 
of  last  term,  I  heard  from  a  crowd  of  attorneys,  who  sur- 
rounded a  little  gentleman,  attired  in  a  wig  and  gown,  and 
were  clamorously  contending  for  his  professional  services, 
which  they  had  respectively  retained,  and  to  which,  from  the 
strenuousness  of  their  adjurations,  they  seemed  to  attach  the 
utmost  value. 

Mr.  O'Loghlin  stood  in  some  suspense  in  the  midst  of  this 
riotous  competition.  While  he  was  deliberating  to  which  of 
the  earnest  applicants  for  his  attendance  he  should  addict 
himself,  I  had  an  opportunity  to  take  notes  of  him.  He  had 
at  first  view  a  very  juvenile  aspect.  His  figure  was  light — 
his  stature  low,  but  his  form  compact,  and  symmetrically  put 
together.  His  complexion  was  fresh  and  healthy,  and  inti- 
mated a  wise  acquaintance  with  the  morning  sun,  more  than  a 
familiarity  with  the  less  salubrious  glimmerings  of  the  midnight 
Jamp.  His  hair  was  of  sanded  hue,  like  that  of  his  Danish 
forefathers,  from  whom  his  name,  which  in  Gaelic  signifies 
Denmark,  as  well  as  his  physiognomy,  intimates  his  descent. 
Although  at  first  he  appeared  to  have  just  passed  the  boun- 
daries of  boyhood,  yet  upon  a  closer  inspection  all  symptoms 


BAR    ASSIZE   COSTUME.  107 

of  puerility  disappeared.  His  Lead  is  large,  and,  from  the 
breadth  and  altitude  of  the  forehead,  denotes  a  more  than 
ordinary  quantity  of  that  valuable  pulp,  with  the  abundance 
of  which  the  intellectual  power  is  said  to  be  in  measure.  His 
large  eyes  of  deep  blue,  although  not  enlightend  by  the  flash- 
ings of  constitutional  vivacity,  carry  a  more,  professional  ex- 
pression, and  bespeak  caution,  sagacity,  and  slyness,  while  his 
mouth  exhibits  a  steadfast  kindliness  of  nature,  and  a  tran- 
quillity of  temper,  mixed  with  some  love  of  ridicule,  and, 
although  perfectly  free  from  malevolence,  a  lurking  tendency 
to  derision.*  An  enormous  bag,  pregnant  with  brefs,  was 
thrown  over  his  shoulder.  To  this  prodigious  wallet  of  litiga- 
tion on  his  back,  his  person  presented  a  curious  contrast. 

At  the  moment  I  surveyed  him,  he  was  surrounded  by  an 
aggregate  meeting  of  attorneys,  each  of  whom  claimed  a  title 
paramount  to  "  the  Counsellor,"  and  vehemently  enforced  their 
respective  rights  to  his  exclusive  appropriation.  He  seemed 
to  be  at  a  loss  to  determine  to  which  of  these  amiable  expos- 
tulators  his  predilections  ought  to  be  given.  I  thought  that 
he  chiefly  hesitated  between  Mr.  Richard   Scott,  the  protector 

*  Mr.  O'Loghlin's  appearance  was  very  distinguished.  He  had  clear  blue 
eyes,  which  almost  seemed  to  smile,  if  I  may  so  express  it.  His  light  hair 
cm-led  closely  and  crisply  on  a  head  which  was  beautifully  set  upon  his  should- 
ers. His  figure  was  compact  and  light,  and,  as  much  as  any  one  whom  I  rec- 
ollect on  the  Munster  Circuit,  his  neatness  of  attire  evidenced  that  he  cultivated 
the  graces.  In  those  days,  barristers  wore  neither  wigs  nor  gowns  in  the 
Assize  Courts,  on  circuit,  and  thus  every  one  could  notice  their  "human  face 
divine,"  without  the  professional  accompaniments  which  so  much  change  its 
expression.  Mr.  O'Connell  very  frequently  wore  a  green  sporting  jacket,  in 
the  Assize  Court  —  but  his  usual  attire  was  the  "customary  suit  of  solemn 
black."  He  was  careful,  and  rather  felicitous,  in  the  tie  of  his  white  cravat, 
but,  when  he  warmed  in  a  speech,  he  used  to  seize  this  article  of  his  dress  and 
pull  it  on  one  side  or  the  other,  occasionally  varying-  the  action,  by  twitching 
his  black  wig  from  right  to  left,  and  back  again,  as  if  to  adjust  it  properly  on 
his  head. —  Mr.  Wolfe,  who  subsequently  became  Chief  Baron  of  the  Excheq- 
uer, presented  a  marked  contrast  to  O'Loghlin  and  O'Connell.  He  was  care- 
less in  his  attire,  wore  his  garments  as  if  he  never  had  consulted  a  mirror,  and 
had  a  habit  of  thrusting  his  long  hands  through  his  dark  hair.  He  was  tall  in 
stature,  awkward  and  angular  in  his  movements,  and  swarthy  in  complexion 
His  voice,  like  that  of  most  Irish  barristers,  was  cl**ar  and  strong;  his  utterance 
pood;  and  his  occasional  emphacising  very  effective  with  juries, —  M. 


108  MICHAEL   O'LOGHLIN. 

of  the  subject  in  Ennis,  and  Mr.  Edward  Hickman,  the  patron 
of  the  crown,  upon  the  Connaught  circuit.  Ned,  a  loyalist  of 
the  brightest  water,  had  hold  of  him  by  one  shoulder,  while 
Dick,  a  patriot  of  the  first  magnitude,  laid  his  grasp  upon  the 
other.  Between  their  rival  attractions,  Mr.  O'Loghlin  stood 
with  a  look,  which,  so  far  from  intimating  that  either  of  "  the 
two  charmers"  should  be  away,  expressed  regret  at  his  inabil- 
ity to  apportion  himself  between  these  fascinating  disputants 
for  his  favors.  Mr.  Scott,  whose  countenance  was  inflamed 
with  anxiety  for  the  numerous  clients,  exhibited  great  vehe- 
mence and  emotion.  His  meteoric  hair  stood  up,  his  quick 
and  eager  eye  was  on  fire,  the  indentations  upon  his  forehead 
were  filled  with  perspiration,  and  the  whole  of  his  strongly 
Celtic  visage  was  moved  by  that  honorable  earnestness,  which 
arises  from  a  solicitude  for  the  interest  of  those  who  intrust 
their  fortunes  to  his  care.  Ned  Hickman,  whose  countenance 
never  relinquishes  the  expression  of  mixed  finesse  and  drol- 
lery for  which  it  is  remarkable,  excepting  when  it  is  laid  down 
for  an  air  of  profound  reverence  for  the  Attorney-General,  was 
amusingly  opposed  to  Mr.  Scott ;  for  Ned  holds  all  emotion  to 
be  vulgar,  and,  on  account  of  its  gentility,  hath  addicted  him- 
self to  self-control. 

Mr.  O'Loghlin,  as  I  have  intimated,  seemed  for  some  time 
to  waver  between  them,  but  at  length  Mr.  Hickman,  by  virtue 
of  a  whisper,  accompanied  by  a  look  of  official  sagacity  (for 
he  is  one  of  the  crown  solicitors),  prevailed,  and  was  carrying 
Mr.  O'Loghlin  off  in  triumph,  when  a  deep  and  rumbling  sound 
was  heard  to  issue  from  the  Court  of  Exchequer,  and  shortly 
after,  there  was  seen  descending  its  steps,  a  form  of  prodigious 
altitude  and  dimensions,  in  whose  masses  of  corpulency,  which 
were  piled  up  to  an  amazing  height,  I  recognised  no  less  emi- 
nent a  person  than  Bumbo  Green.*     He  came  like  an  ambula- 

*  The  individual  known  as  "  Bumbo"  Green,  was  well  known,  in  the  Irish 
law-Courts,  some  five-and-twenty  years  ago.  I  saw  him  once  —  and  to  see  was 
to  remember.  He  was  an  attorney  in  good  practice ;  hailing,  I  believe,  from 
the  west  of  Ireland.  He  knew  the  private  affairs  of  three  fourths  of  the  estated 
gentlemen  in  the  counties  of  Galway  and  Clare,  and  no  lawsuit  of  any  impor- 
tance was  entered  into,  in  that  part  of  the  world,  without  Mr.  Gieen  being  em- 


BUMBO    GREEN.  109 

tory  hill.  This  enormous  Leap  of  animation  approached  to 
put  in  his  claim  to  Mr.  O'Loghlin.  Bumbo  had  an  action, 
which  was  to  be  tried  before  Chief  Baron  O'Grady  against 
the  proprietor  of  the  mail-coach  to  Ennis,  for  not  having 
provided  a  vehicle  large  enough  to  contain  him.  Mr.  O'Logh- 
lin Avas  to  state  his  case.  Bumbo  had  espied  the  capture 
which  Ned  Hickman  had  made  of  his  favorite  counsel.  It 
was  easy  to  perceive,  from  the  expression  of  resolute  sever- 
ity which  sat  upon  his  vast  and  angry  visage,  that  he  was  de- 
termined not  to  acquiesce  in  this  unwarrantable  proceeding. 
As  he  advanced,  Ned  Hickman  stood  appalled,  and,  conscious 
of  the  futility  of  remonstrance,  let  loose  the  hold  which  he 
had  upon  the  Counsellor,  while  the  latter,  with  that  involun- 
tary and  somewhat  reluctant,  but  inevitable  submission,  which 
is  instinctively  paid  to  great  by  little  men,  obeyed  the  nod 
of  his  enormous  employer,  and,  with  the  homage  which  the 
Attorney-General  for  Lilliput  might  be  supposed  to  entertain 
for  a  solicitor  from  Brobdignag,  passively  yielded  to  the  do- 
ployed,  on  one  side  or  the  other.  He  was  "  a  noticeable  man"  (to  use  Cole- 
ridge's phrase) — but  chiefly  on  account  of  his  immense  size.  The  great  Dan- 
iel Laml  ert  died  before  my  time,  so  that  I  can  not  pei'sonally  compare  him  with 
Bumbo  Green  ;  —  I  suspect  that  in  corporeal  extent  there  could  not  have  been 
much  difference.  Mr.  Green  was  the  biggest  man  I  ever  saw.  He  was  tall, 
but,  from  his  obesity,  appeared  below  the  ordinaiy  stature.  He  had  a  smiling, 
winning  manner,  and  was  liked,  for  his  good  temper  and  fun,  by  every  one.  To 
see  him  attempt  to  sit  down  on  the  attorney's  narrow  bench  was  ludicrous  in 
the  extreme.  What  is  called  "  the  small  of  the  back"  he  was  not  possessor  of, 
and  therefore  to  rest  upon  a  narrow  seat  was  as  hopeless  a  task  for  him,  as  it 
would  have  been  for  a  cherub  —  but  from  quite  a  different  cause,  "Bumbo" 
Green  having  a  redundancy  of  what  cherubs  are  so  deficient  in,  that  it  is  evident 
they  never  can  sit  for  their  portraits !  Bumbo  Green  flourished  in  the  ante- 
railway  era,  and,  on  a  journey,  had  to  occupy  and  pay  for  two  seats  in  the 
stage-coach.  On  one  occasion,  he  ordered  his  servant  to  take  two  seats  foi 
him  in  the  mail-coach  from  Ennis  to  Dublin.  The  man  executed  the  command, 
but,  being  a  rather  green  hand,  only  a  few  days  in  Green's  employment,  com* 
mitted  a  trifling  mistake.  When  Bumbo  Green  went  to  the  coach-office,  he 
found  all  the  inside  seats  occupied,  except  one.  His  servant  not  knowing  his 
habit,  had  taken  the  seats  —  one  outside,  and  the  other  within!  —  Bumbo 
Green,  like  nearly  all  very  stout  men  whom  I  have  ever  known,  was  fond  of 
dancing,  and  danced  lightly  too.  He  had  a  great  many  good  qualities,  and 
the  perpetual  sunshine  of  good  temper  gleamed  brightly  over  them  all. —  M. 


110  MICHAEL    O'LOGHLIN. 

minion,  and  followed  into  the  Exchequer  the  gigantic  waddlo 
of  Bumbo  Green. 

But  a  truce  to  merriment.     The  merits  of  Mr.  O'Loghlin, 
with  whom  I  open  this   continuation  of  the  Sketches  of  the 
Catholic  Bar,  are  of  a  character  which  demand  a  serious  and 
most   respectful    consideration.     He    is    not    of    considerable 
standing,  and  yet  is  in  the  receipt  of  an  immense   income, 
which  the  most  jealous  of  his  competitors  will  not  venture  to 
insinuate   that  he   does   not   deserve.      He   is   in   the  utmost 
demand  in  the  Hall  of  the  Four  Courts,  and  is  among  the  very- 
best  of  the  commodities  which  are  to  be  had  in  that  staple  of 
the  mind.     He  is  admitted,  upon  all  hands,  to  be  an  excellent 
lawyer,  and  a  master  of  the  practice  of  the  courts,  which  is  of 
far  greater  importance  than  the  black  and  recondite  erudition, 
to  which  so  many  barristers  exclusively  devote  so  many  years 
of  unavailing  labor.     The  questions  to  which  deep  learning  is 
applicable  are  of  frequent  occurrence,  while  points  connected 
with   the  course   and  forms  of  legal  proceedings  arise   every 
day,  and  afford  to  a  barrister,  who  has  made  them  his  study, 
an  opportunity  of  rendering  himself  greatly  serviceable  to  his 
clients.     It  is  not  by  displays  of  research  upon  isolated  occa- 
sions, that  a  valuable  and  money-making  reputation  is  to  be 
established.      "  Practice,"  as   it   is   technically   called,   is  the 
alchemy  of  the  Bar.     When  it  is  once  ascertained  that  a  law- 
yer is  master  of  it,  he  becomes  the  main  resource  of  attorneys, 
who  depend  upon  him  for  their  guidance  through  the  mazes 
of  every  intricate  and  complicated  case.     Mr.  O'Loghlin  has 
Tidd  at  his  fingers'  ends,  and  is,  besides,  minutely  acquainted 
with   that  unwritten   and  traditional  practice  which   governs 
Irish  justice  ;  and  which,  not  having  been  committed  to  books, 
is  acquired  by  an  unremitting  attention  to  what  is  going  on  in 
court* 

*  Mention  has  been  made,  in  a  previous  note,  of  the  rates  of  payment  to  the 
judges,  varying  from  eight  hundred  to  one  thousand  pounds  sterling  a  year 
(the  salaries  of  Irish  Assistant-Barristers,  Scottish  Sheriffs,  and  English  County 
Court  Judges),  to  ten  thousand  pounds  sterling  per  annum,  the  amount  fixed, 
by  Act  of  Parliament,  as  the  Lord-Chancellor's  official  income.  Those  who 
are  accustomed  to  the  present  very  small  remuneration  allowed  to  the  occu- 
pants of  judicial  seats  in  the  United  States  may  consider  the  British  payment 


BRITISH    SYSTEM   OF   JUDICATURE.  ill 

It  is  not  to  be  considered,  from  the  praise  bestowed  upon 
Mr.  O'Loglilin  in  this  most  useful  department  of  his  profession, 
that  he  does  not  possess  other  and  very  superior  qualifications. 

as  extravagant  —  especially,  as  the  offices  (with  the  exception   of  the  Chancel- 
lorship, which  is  political  as  well  as  legal)  are  held  for  life,  or  during  good  be- 
havior, which  is  the  same.     Added  to  this  is  the  system  of  granting  pensions 
or  retiring  allowances  to  the  judges  —  amounting  to  nearly  two  thirds  of  their 
annual  salaries  —  after  fifteen  years'    service  or  in  the  event  of  earlier  retire- 
ment from  ill  health.     The  British  plan  is  based  upon  a  very  broad  principle  — 
namely,  that  of  tempting  the  very  best  lawyers  to  become  judges,  by  making  it 
worth  their  while  to  surrender  the  great  incomes  which  they  can  earn  at  the 
bar.     In  Great  Britain  and  Ireland,  a  lawyer  in  full  practice  may  earn  from 
three  thousand  to  twelve  thousand  pounds  sterling  per  annum  —  some  have  ob- 
tained more.     To  tempt  any  of  these  men,  in  the  prime  of  life  and  the  fullness 
of  profitable  labor,  to  assume  the  ermine  of  the  judge  instead  of  the  gown  of 
the  barrister,  there  are  three  or  four  conjunct  inducements.     There  is  a  perma- 
nent station  of  honorable  rank  secured  to  him  who  becomes  a  judge.     There  is 
a  certain  income,  which,  though  far  lower  than  he  may  have  previously  earned, 
is  obtained  in  comparative  ease  and  repose.     There  is  the  removal  of  all  doubt 
as  to  the  future  —  for  a  failure  of  health  may  assail  the  most  active  lawyer,  and 
speedily  incapacitate  him  from  future  exertion,  whereas,  when  a  judge,  he  may 
retire  after  a  certain  length  of  public  service,  provided  for,  during  the  residue 
of  life,  by  the  bountiful  gratitude  of  the  public,  which  also  provides  for  his  fu- 
ture, in  case  of  his  health  breaking  up.     On  the  bench,  it  is  true,  a  lawyer  does 
not  wholly  enjoy  "  otium  cum  dignitate," —  for  the  judge,  if  he  do  his  duty, 
has  no  sinecure.     But  he  is  removed  from  the  cares,  the  bustle,  the  struggles, 
which  are  inseparable  from  the  active  life  of  a  busy  lawyer,  and  which  form 
the  wear  and  tear  of  his  mind,  and  he  assumes  a  position  of  dignified  and  hon- 
orable labor,  in  the  discharge  of  duties  more  important  than  those  of  an  advo- 
cate, while  they  are  of  a  different  and  less  mind-oppressing  order.     A  seat 
upon  the  judicial  bench,  therefore,  is  the  object  of  a  British  lawyer's  honorable 
ambition,  for  which  he  strives  and  competes  —  not  by  linking  himself  with  any 
political  party,  not  by  descending  to  canvassing  or  solicitation,  but  by  knowl- 
edge of  the  laws,  by  industry,  and  by  unimpeachable  conduct.     These  judicial 
appointments  are  virtually  held  for  life,  because  the  becoming  entitled  to  a 
pension  after  fifteen  years'  service,  does  not  necessarily  cause  a  judge  to  z-etire 
at  the  expiration  of  that  period.      For  the  most  part,  we  find  the  judges  con- 
tinuing in  office  to  the  end.     Of  late  years  there  have  been  only  two  retirements  — 
Erskine  (son  of  the  Chancellor)  from  ill  health,  and,  more  recently,    Patteson, 
from  deafness.     It  is  to  the  credit  of  George  III.  (who  had  the  good  sense, 
amid  much  obtuseness,  sometimes  to  take  advice)  to  commence  his  reign,  in  17GC't 
by  recommending  Parliament  to  enact  that  the  judges  should  not  be  removable,  as 
before,  by  the  demise  of  the  Sovereign  cancelling  their  Commissions.     It  had 
been  the  custom  to  issue  new  Commissions,  in  such  cases,  and  then  a  judge 
yfho  had  rendered  himself  obnoxious  by  independence,  might  be  displaced,  a-' 


112  MICHAEL    o'lOGHLTX. 

He  is  familiar  with  every  branch  of  tlie  law,  and  has  bis 
knowledge  always  at  command.  There  are  many  whose 
learning  lies  in  their  minds,  like  treasure  in  rusty  coffers  which 
it  is  a  toil  to  open,  or  masses  of  bullion  in  the  vaults  of  the 
Bank  of  Ireland,  unfit  for  the  purposes  of  exchange,  and  diffi- 
cult to  be  put  into  circulation.  Mr.  O'Loghlin  bears  his  wealth 
about  him  —  he  can  immediately  apply  it — and  carries  his 
faculties  like  coined  money,  "  in  numerate*  liahet"  He  is  not 
a  maker  of  sentences,  and  does  not  impress  his  phrases  on  the 
memory  of  his  hearers;  but  he  has  what  is  far  better  than 
what  is  vulgarly  designated  as  eloquence.  He  is  perfectly 
fluent,  easy,  and  natural.  His  thoughts  run  in  a  smooth  and 
clear  current,  and  his  diction  is  their  appropriate  channel. 
His  perceptions  are  exceedingly  quick,  and  his  utterance  is, 
therefore,  occasionally  rapid  ;  but,  although  he  speaks  at  times 
with  velocity,  he  never  does  so  with  precipitation.  He  is 
extremely    brief,   and    indulges    in    no    useless    amplification. 

matter  of  routine,  on  the  accession  of  a  new  sovereign.  The  result  has  been 
that,  since  this  independence  has  thus  been  established,  we  have  had  some  re- 
markable instances  where  a  judge  has  acted  directly  in  opposition  to  the  desires 
and  interests  of  the  Government.  For  example,  Lord  Camden  (when  Chief 
Justice  of  the  Common  Pleas,  in  1763)  decided  that  the  Secretary  of  State  had 
acted  illegally,  in  arresting  John  Wilkes,  on  a  general  warrant — which  ought 
not  to  be  issued  except  in  the  urgent  case  of  high  treason.  So,  a  few  years  ago, 
Lord  Chief  Justice  Denman's  denial,  as  a  constitutional  lawyer  (in  re  Stock 
dale  v.  Howard)  that  either  House  of  Parliament  had  a  right  to  publish  libels, 
as  part  of  their  proceedings,  and  to  authorize  their  public  sale.  In  England,  there 
are  few  instances  of  a  judge  soiling  his  ermine  by  truckling  to  Power.  I  rec- 
ollect only  two  instances  in  my  own  time.  Once,  on  the  trial  of  William  Hone 
for  publishing  parodies  on  parts  of  the  Bible  (his  real  offence  being  that  he 
had  ridiculed  the  Prince  Regent)  when  Lord  Ellenborough  actually  desired  the 
jury  to  bring  in  a  verdict  of  guilty,  which  they  declined  doing.  The  other, 
during  the  trial  of  the  Chartist  rioters,  when  Lord  Abinger,  who  tried  the  case, 
acted  more  like  the  prosecuting  counsel  than  the  judger  and  roundly  abused 
the  prisoners  on  account  of  their  politics.  But  in  Ireland,  where  there  are 
comrpt  sheriffs  and  packed  juries,  partisan  judges  have  not  been  so  r"\re. 
That  class  did  not  cease  with  Lord  Norbury:  it  still  exists.  In  questions  be- 
tween man  and  man,  the  bulk  of  the  Irish  judges  have  shown  praiseworthy  im- 
partiality. When  it  was  the  Government  against  the  subject,  the  case  some- 
times became  different.  The  State  Trials  of  1844  and  1848,  were  conducted 
in  a  manner  which  reminded  us  of  1798,  and  which  would  have  almost  driver 
England  into  insurrection,  had  it  occurred  there. —  M. 


STANDISH   o'gRADT.  113 

There  is  not  the  smallest  trace  of  affectation  in  anything 
which  he  either  does  or  says ;  and  it  is  surprising  with  what 
little  appearance  of  exertion  he  brings  all  the  powers  of  his 
mind  into  play.  His  points  are  put  with  so  much  brevity,  sim- 
plicity, and  clearness,  that  he  has,  of  necessity,  become  a  great 
favorite  with  the  Judges,  who  give  him  a  willing  audience, 
because  he  is  sure  to  be  pertinent  and  short ;  and  having  said 
all  that  is  fitting  to  be  said,  and  no  more,  has  immediately 
done.  He  is  listened  to  the  more  readily,  because  he  is  appa- 
rently frank  and  artless ;  but  he  merely  puts  on  a  show  of 
candor,  for  few  possess  more  suppleness  and  craft. 

No  man  adapts  himself  with  more  felicity  to  the  humors  and 
the  predispositions  of  the  judges  whom  he  addresses.  Take, 
for  example,  the  Exchequer,  where,  both  on  the  law  and  equity 
sides  of  the  court,  he  is  in  immense  business.  He  appeals  to 
the  powerful  understanding,  and  sheer  common-sense,  of 
Standish    O'Grady,*    in    whom    Rhadamanthus    and    Sancho 

*  Of  Standish  O'Grady,  Chief-Baron  of  the  Irish  Exchequer,  from  1803  to 
1831,  a  notice  has  already  been  given  (vol  i.,  p.  135),  but  an  anecdote  can 
scarcely  be  out  of  place  here.  He  had  a  caustic  wit,  which  was  the  more 
keen  because  ever  unobtrusive.  The  quiet  manner  in  which  the  Chief-Baron 
would  insult  a  man,  barbed  the  shaft.  For  example,  a  certain  Mr.  Burke 
Bethell  was  at  the  Irish  bar.  He  had  ability,  learning-,  eloquence,  and  indus- 
try, but  was  one  of  the  men  who  appeared  as  if  born  under  an  evil  star,  and 
never  could  get  on.  It  was  stated,  and  believed,  that  he  took  business  at  any 
rate  —  that  is,  he  would  initial  a  brief  marked  two,  five,  or  ten  guineas,  as  if 
he  had  received  that  amount  (for  without  such  proof  of  payment  the  taxing- 
master  would  strike  the  item  out  of  the  attorney's  bill  of  costs),  and  accept  a 
fourth  of  the  nominal  sum.  This  had  reached  the  ears  of  O'Grady,  who  had 
never  known  the  want  of  money,  and  had  a  lofty  idea  of  what  is  called  "  the 
dignity  of  the  profession."  On  one  occasion,  Burke  Bethell  had  the  luck,  by 
some  accident,  to  receive  a  brief  in  some  small  case  in  which  the  Crown  was 
seeking  penalties,  under  the  Excise  laws,  from  some  fiscal  delinquent.  The 
Court  of  Exchequer  was  the  tribunal  before  which  the  case  was  to  be  tried, 
Bethell,  determined  to  cut  a  figure,  had  somewhat  Adonized  his  attire,  and 
presented  himself  before  the  Chief-Baron,  who,  affecting  not  to  recognise  him 
(wearing  the  unusual  disguise  of  a  clean  shirt),  surveyed  him  through  his  eye* 
glass,  and,  stooping  down,  asked  who  the  gentleman  was  —  with  an  air  like  that 
which  Brummell  must  have  worn  when  he  asked  his  companion,  who  stopped 
to  speak  to  George  IV.,  "  Who  is  your  fat  friend  ?"  — Bethel,  with  an  air  of 
great  importance,  thus  commenced  :  "  My  Lord,  on  this  occasion,  I  have  the 
honor  to  appear  for  the  Crown."     The  Chief-Baron,  interrupting  him,  in  his 


114  MICHAEL    O  LOG  H  LIN. 

Panza  seem  combined.     He  hits  the  metaphysical  propensi- 
ties of  Baron  Smith,*  with   a  distinction,  in  which  it  would 

blandest  manner,  and  with  his  sweetest  smile,  interjected,  "  And,  sometimes, 
I  believe,  Mr.  BetheW,  for  the  half-crown  .'"  —  On  the  subject  of  taking  less 
than  the  regulation  fee  or  honorarium,  I  recollect  an  illustration  or  two.  Fitz- 
gibbon,  father  of  Lord-Chancellor  Clare,  was  a  lawyer  in  good  practice,  and 
very  fond  of  money.  A  client  once  brought  him  a  brief  and  fee,  that  he  might 
personally  apologize  for  the  smallness  of  tbe  latter.  Fitzgibbon,  muttering  that 
they  should  have  intermediately  reached  h.m  through  the  hands  of  an  attocney, 
took  both  —  but  looked  most  gloomily  on  the  very  limited  amount  of  the  fee.  The 
client  soiTOwfully  admitted  the  cause  for  discontent,  but  added,  that  it  was  "  all 
he  had  in  the  world."  —  "Well,  then,"  said  Fitzgibbon,  "as  that's  the  case, 
and  you  have  no  more,  why,  I  must  —  take  it."  Which  he  did,  no  doubt. — To 
match  this,  there  is  an  anecdote  of  a  certain  Mr.  Sergeant  Cockle,  of  the  Eng- 
lish bar,  wbo  was  accused  of  the  grave  offence  of  having  taken  a  half  fee,  and 
even  of  having  accepted  part  of  the  money  in  tbe  copper  coin  of  the  realm. 
The  charge  duly  came  before  tbe  bar-mess  for  adjudication,  and  was  fully  sus- 
tained by  evidence.  In  defence,  Cockle  briefly  said :  "  It  is  quite  true  that  I 
took  half  a  guinea,  where  tbe  fee  should  have  been  a  guinea,  and  that  it  was 
made  up  of  a  crown-piece,  four  shillings,  two  sixpences,  and  sixpence  in  cop- 
per." There  was  a  great  sensation  on  this  confession  of  tbe  charge.  But 
Cockle  went  on  :  "  But,  gentlemen,  before  I  took  the  money,  I  ascertained  it 
was  the  last  farthing  the  poor  devil  had,  and  I  appeal  to  the  honorable  profes- 
sion, whether,  under  such  circumstances,  taking  his  last  penny  from  him,  I  was 
not  quite  justified,  and  have  maintained  the  character  of  the  bar?"  It  was 
unanimously  agreed  that  he  had  done  all  that  a  lawyer  could  do,  in  such  a 
case,  and,  honorably  acquitting  Cockle,  the  bar-mess  inflicted  the  fine  of  a 
basket  of  claret  upon  his  accuser  —  the  grand  rule  at  all  mess-trials  being  that 
somebody  must  be  mulcted  in  the  generous  juice  of  the  grape  !  —  How  different 
is  this  merely  professional  acquisitiveness  from  the  generous  feeling  of  the 
sailor  at  Gibraltar,  during  the  early  and  warlike  years  of  the  present  century. 
Landing  at  "  the  Rock,"  with  his  comrades,  all  agreed,  having  plenty  of 
money,  that  it  would  be  suitable  and  creditable  for  each  to  purchase  a  gold- 
laced  cocked-hat.  On  reassembling  at  night,  one  man  had  a  silver-laced  hat 
and  was  immediately  denounced  (with  a  piwnise  of  early  cobbing,  when  they 
were  on  board)  as  a  shabby  fellow.  His  protest  had  all  the  energy  of  truth. 
"  Messmates,"  said  he,  "  I  scorn  the  charge.  When  I  went  to  the  man  who 
sells  the  gold-lacers,  I  found  that  he  had  not  one  left.  So,  I  took  this  silver- 
lacer,  but  paid  him  for  it  all  as  one  as  if  Hwere  gold."  Of  course,  Jack  was 
honorably  acquitted.  —  M. 

*  Sir  William  Cusack  Smith,  one  of  the  Barons  of  the  Exchequer  in  Ireland, 
was  a  remarkable  man.  He  was  born  in  January,  1766,  and  died  in  August, 
1836,  in  his  seventy-first  year.  His  father,  Sir  Michael  Smith,  was  a  great 
lawyer,  and  finally  became  Master  of  the  Rolls.  The  younger  Smith  studied 
at  Oxford,    ind  there  obtained  the  friendship  of  Edmund  Burke,  at   whogg 


sra  w.  c.  smitM.  115 

have  puzzled  St.  Thomas  Aquinas,  without  the  aid  of  inspira- 
tion, to  detect  a  difference  :  when  every  other  argument  has 
failed  with  Baron  M'Cleland,  he  tips  him  the  wink,  and  point- 

c  juntry-house,  in  a  neighboring  county,  he  passed  all  his  leisure.  In  1788,  he 
was  called  to  the  Irish  bar,  and  soon  after  became  Doctor  of  Civil  Law,  to 
qualify  him  for  practice  in  the  Ecclesiastical  Courts.  In  1795,  Mr.  William 
Smith  was  made  king's  counsel,  and  entered  Parliament  in  the  same  year.  He 
strenuously  supported  the  Union,  not  only  by  his  votes  and  speeches,  but  as  a 
pamphleteer.  In  1800,  he  was  made  Solicitor-General,  and  in  1802,  when  his 
father,  who  then  was  a  puisne  Baron  of  the  Exchequer,  was  raised  to  the  higher 
dignity  of  Master  of  the  Rolls  (the  second  equity  Judge  in  Ireland,  and  not 
removable  as  the  Chancellor  is,  on  a  change  of  ministry),  the  younger  Smith 
succeeded  him.  In  1808,  by  his  father's  death,  he  succeeded  to  the  baronetcy. 
Sir  William  Smith,  who  had  studied  in  the  school  of  Burke,  was  what  is  called 
"  an  old  whig,"  and  strongly  advocated  the  justice  and  policy  of  Catholic 
Emancipation.  When  this  was  granted,  and  the  Repeal  agitation  followed, 
Sir  William  Smith  denounced  it  as  impolitic,  ungrateful,  and  illegal.  Up  to 
that  time,  he  had  been  in  high  favor  with  the  Catholic  leaders.  But,  in  Feb- 
ruary, 1834,  Mr.  O'Connell  moved  that  the  House  of  Commons  should  appoint 
a  Committee  to  inquire  into  Sir  William  Smith's  judicial  conduct — mainly 
complaining  that,  in  his  charges  to  grand-juries  at  the  Assizes,  he  largely  in- 
troduced political  subjects,  and  that  his  habits  were  singularly  at  variance  with 
what  ought  to  be  the  habits  of  a  judge.  It  was  stated  by  Mr.  O'Connell  (and 
not  denied)  that  Baron  Smith  commonly  came  into  the  Court  about  half-past 
twelve  at  noon  —  that  he  thus  delayed  the  despatch  of  business  —  that,  at  Ar- 
magh, he  had  tried  fourteen  prisoners  between  six  o'clock  in  the  evening  and 
six  in  the  morning  —  that  one  of  these  trials  had  actually  commenced  long 
after  midnight,  and  that  his  whole  course  was  irregular.  This  primd-facie  case 
against  Baron  Smith  was  so  strong,  that  (the  whig  ministry  siding  with  Mr. 
O'Connell)  the  motion  for  inquiVy  was  carried  by  a  majority  of  1(57  to  74.  A 
week  after,  however,  Mr.  Peel  and  his  party  reopened  the  question,  defended 
Baron  Smith,  accused  O'Connell  of  personal  and  vindictive  motives,  and  pro- 
posed that  the  vote  for  inquiry  be  rescinded  —  which  was  done,  by  a  majority 
of  165  to  159.  There  is  no  doubt  that  Baron  Smith's  habits  had  latterly  be- 
come very  eccentric.  As  a  judge  he  was  impartial,  and  was  humane  even  to 
a  fault.  He  had  a  horror  of  sentencing  a  culprit  to  death,  and  "  leant  to  mer- 
cy's side"  on  the  trial  of  all  capital  offences.  He  was  attached  to  letters,  and 
published  several  pamphlets,  chiefly  on  politics,  which  are  forgotten.  He  also 
was  author  of  an  examination  of  the  Hohenloe  miracles.  The  only  work  by 
which  he  is  likely  to  be  remembered  as  an  author,  is  a  singular  productioi 
called  "  Metaphysical  Rambles."  —  His  second  son,  Thomas  Berry  Cusack 
Smith,  Attorney-General  under  the  Peel  administiation,  conducted  the  O'Con- 
nell State  Trials  in  1844.  He  is  now  (1854)  Master  of  the  Rolls,  as  his  grand- 
father was,  and  completes  the  singular  instance  of  three  out  of  one  family  having 
successively  worn  the  ermine.  —  M. 


11$  MICHAEL   0*LOGHL!tf. 

ing  with  liis  thumb  to  the  opposite  attorney,  suggests  the 
merits  of  the  client,  by  a  pantomimic  reference  to  those  of  his 
representative;  and  with  the  same  spirit  of  exquisite  adapta- 
tion, plunges  into  the  darkest  abysses  of  black-letter  erudition 
with  Baron  Pennefather,  and  provokes  his  Lordship  into  a 
citation  from  the  Year-books  (which  excruciates  the  ears  of  Mr. 
Furlong)  in  Tipperary  French. 

Mr.  O'Loghlin  is  a  native  of  Clare**  I  had  at  first,  and 
berore  I  had  made  more  minute  inquiries,  conjectured,  from 
the  omega  in  his  name,  that  he  must  be  lineally  descended 
from  some  of  the  ancient  monarchs  of  Ireland,  or  be  at  least 
collaterally  connected  with  one  of  the  Phenician  .dj'nasties. 
Upon  investigation,  however,  I  discovered  that  "  the  big  0," 
the  celebrated  object  of  royal  antipathy,  was  but  a  modern  an- 
nexation ;  and  that,  as  I  have  already  intimated,  Mr.  O'Loghlin 

*  The  late  Sir  Michael  O'Loghlin,  it  is  scarcely  too  much  to  say,  was  one  of 
the  best  judges  that  Ireland  ever  possessed.  Able,  acute,  clear-headed,  and 
thoroughly  just,  he  towered  above  his  fellows.  He  was  born  in  October,  1789, 
and  though  he  had  immense  practice  at  the  bar,  was  excluded  by  his  religion 
(he  was  a  Catholic)  from  obtaining  professional  prefeiment  as  early  as  he  de- 
served it.  When  the  liberals  came  into  power,  after  the  granting  of  Emanci- 
pation, his  talents  obtained  due  recognition.  He  was  made  third  Sergeant  in 
1831;  second  Sergeant  in  1832;  Solicitor-General  in  1834;  Attorney-Gen- 
eral in  1835  ;  and  was  made  one  of  the  Barons  of  the  Exchequer  in  1836  — 
being,  I  think,  the  first  Catholic  judge  for  one  hundred  and  fifty  years.  On 
the  Bench  he  maintained  and,  if  possible,  incx'eased  the  reputation  he  had  won 
at  the  bar.  All  parties  and  all  creeds  honored  and  respected  the  upright  judge, 
and  the  urbane  and  accomplished  gentleman.  There  was  a  general  feeling  of 
gratification,  at  the  bar,  and  among  the  public,  when,  in  1837,  he  was  raised  to 
the  dignity  of  Master  of  the  Rolls.  In  this  capacity,  he  showed  the  great  grasp 
of  his  mind,  for,  though  his  bar-practice  had  chiefly  been  at  common  law,  his 
decisions  in  equity  were  irrefragable.  In  1838,  he  was  created  a  Baronet.  Sir 
Michael  O'Loghlin  died,  September,  1842,  aged  fifty-three.  The  legal  profes- 
sion of  Ireland,  who  knew  his  value,  raised  a  large  sum  for  the  purpose  of  erect- 
ing a  monument  to  perpetuate  their  sense  of  his  worth.  It  has  been  erected, 
and  consists  of  his  statue,  by  M'Dowall  (an  Irish  artist),  which  is  appropriately 
placed  in  the  Hall  of  the  Four  Courts,  Dublin  —  the  only  other  statue  in  that 
suitable  situation  being  one  of  Justice,  toward  which  it  looks.  —  Sir  Coleman 
O'Loghlin,  educated  at  London  University,  and  called  to  the  Irish  bar  in  1840, 
is  eldest  son  of  the  late  Master  of  the  Rolls,  and  has  already  obtained  a  high 
reputation.  He  was  employed  for  the  defence,  in  the  State  Trials  of  1844  and 
1848,  and  acquitted  himseF  with  great  distinction. —  M. 


BIS    DANISH    ANCESTOR.  117 

is  of  a  Danish  origin.     It  has  often  been  observed  that  the 
face  of  some  remote  progenitor  reappears,  after  the  lapse  of 
centuries,  in  his  progeny  ;   and  in  walking  through  the  halls 
of  ancient  families,  it  is  surprising   sometimes  to  see,  in  the 
little  boy  who  whips  his  top  beside  you,  a  transcript  of  some 
old  warrior  who  frowns  in  armor  on  the  mouldering  canvass 
above  your  head.     There  is  preserved  among  the  O'Loghlins 
a  picture  of  their  ancestor.     He  was  a  captain  in  the  Danish 
navy.     The  likeness  of  this  able  cruiser  off  the  Irish  coast  to 
the   Counsellor  is   wonderful.     He  was  a  small,  square,  com- 
pact, and  active  little  fellow,  with  great  shrewdness  and  intel- 
ligence of  expression.     Domestic  tradition  has  preserved  some 
traits  of  his  character,  which  show  that  the  mind,  as  well   as 
the  face,  can  be  preserved  during  ages  of  unimpaired  trans- 
mission  to   the  last.     He  was  remarkable  for  his  skill  as  a 
navigator.     Not  a  pilot  in  all  Denmark  worked  a  ship  better. 
He  sent  his  light  and  quick-sailing  galley  through   the  most 
intricate  quicksands.     His  coolness  and  self-possession  never 
deserted  him,  and  in  the  worst  weather  he  was  sure  to  get  into 
port.     He  generally  kept  close  to  the  shore,  and  seldom  sailed 
upon  desperate  adventures.     Remarkable  for  his  talent  in  sur- 
prising the  enemy,  and  stealing  into  their  creeks  and  harbors, 
he  would  unexpectedly  assail  them,  and  carry  some  rich  prize 
away.     The  descendant  of  this  eminent  cruiser  works  a  cause 
upon  the  same  principles  as  his  ancestor  commanded  a  ship. 
He  holds  the  helm  with  a  steady  and  skilful  hand,  and  shifts 
his  sails  with  the  nicest  adaptation  to  every  veering  circum- 
stance that  occurs  in  his  course.     Sometimes,  indeed,  he  goes 
very  close  to  the  wind,  but  never  misses   stays.     I  scarcely 
ever  saw  him  aground.     He  hits  his  adversary  between  wind 
and  water,  and,  when  he  lies  most  secure,  sails  into  his  anchor- 
age, boards,  and  cuts  him  out.     It  is  not,  therefore,  to  be  won- 
dered at,  that  he  is  in  as  great  practice  in  the  Hall  as  his  fore- 
father was  upon  the  ocean,  of  whom  it  is  recorded  that  he  — 

"Pursued  o'er  the  high  seas,  his  watery  journey, 
And  merely  practised  as  a  sea-attorney." 


FRANCIS    BLACKBURNE. 

I  am  one  of  those  whose  political  information  is  derived 
from  a  perusal  of  "The  Weekly  Register,"*  through  the  ample 
columns  of  which  I  disport  myself  upon  Saturday  evening, 
and  refresh  myself  with  news  much  older  than  the  beverage 
with  which  I  raise  my  spirit  to  the  proper  pitch  of  patriotism, 
in  order  to  wash  down  the  eloquence  of  the  Catholic  Associa- 
tion. While  others  busy  themselves  in  political  anticipations, 
and  leave  Time  panting  and  toiling  after  them,  I  follow  him 
at  a  distance,  and  am  contented  if,  upon  the  eve  of  the  Sab- 
bath, I  can  collect  enough  of  news  to  join  in  the  discussions 
of  divers  Popish  counsellors,  who  assemble  at  half  past  one 
o'clock  to  offer  their  devotions  to  "  our  Lady  of  Carmel,"  under 
the  auspices  of  Mr.  L'Estrange,  in  the  avenues  of  Clarendon- 
street  Chapel.  In  this  sacred  spot,  just  after  benediction,  one 
may  observe  a  certain  convocation  of  politic  lawyers  with 
huge  prayer-books,  bound  in  green  morocco,  under  their  arms. 
After  years  of  hebdomadal  employment,  the  golden  pages  of 
these  holy  volumes  look  as  bright  and  fresh  as  when  they 
issued  from  the  burnishing  hands  of  the  bookseller  to  May- 
nooth  College,  and  bear  evidence  of  the  care  which  the  pious 

*  A  newspaper  of  great  influence  in  those  days  (1827)  and  for  twenty  yeais 
after.  It  sided  with  Mr.  O'Connell  through  the  great  struggle  for  Emancipa- 
tion, and  the  various  efforts  to  obtain  Repeal,  by  means  of  a  Parliamentary 
enactment.  When  Mr.  Duffy,  in  The  Nation,  and  Mr.  John  Mitchel,  in  TJie 
United  Irishman,  advocated  the  bolder  policy  of  force  (argument  having  whol- 
ly failed)  the  Weekly  Register,  which  was  opposed  to  physical  force,  fell  to  the 
ground. —  M. 


STEPHEN"   WOLFE   AND   WOLFE   TONE.  119 

votaries  of  Themis  have  taken  not  to  profane  them  with  too 
frequent  an  application  of  their  forensic  fingers. 

But  this  is  parenthetically  observed  — I  was  going  on  to 
say,  that  I  merely  prepared  myself  upon  Saturday  evening  to 
talk  over  the  memory  of  Lord  Wellesley  with  Mr.  Farrel ;  the 
lamentable  increase  of  crime  upon  the  Minister  circuit  with 
Mr.  Wolfe  ;#  sacerdotal  riots  at  Birr,  and  the  validity  of  ex- 
communication with  Mr.  Cruise;  and  the  recollections  of  Wolfe 
Tonet  with  Mr.  Sheil.  Such  being  my  indifference  to  political 
events,  it  not  unfrequently  happens  that  a  great  incident  takes 
place  of  which  I  do  not  hear  until  after  its  more  immediate 
effects  upon  the  public  mind  have  subsided  —  until  after  Mr. 
O'Connell  has  ordered  a  gown  of  Irish  silk  in  the  Libertv  ; 
Mr.  Sergeant  Lefroy  has  sought  the  consolations  of  religion 

*  Stephen  Wolfe,  a  good  lawyer  and  a  liberal  man,  obtained  neither  notice 
nor  pi'eferment  from  the  anti-liberal  Governments  preceding  the  grant  of  Eman- 
cipation. In  1834,  he  was  made  third  Sergeant :  Solicitor-General  in  1836, 
Attorney-General  in  1837,  and  Chief  Baron  of  the  Exchequer  in  1838.  on  the 
death  of  Joy.  Mr.  Wolfe  earnestly  pressed  the  Government  to  appoint  Mr. 
Pennefather,  as  fittest  for  this  post,  and  that  he  (Wolfe)  should  merely  take 
the  puisne  judgeship  to  be  vacated  by  the  pi-omotion  of  Pennefather.  But  the 
Government,  whose  politics  differed  very  much  from  those  of  Mr.  Pennefather, 
declared  that,  under  no  circumstances,  would  they  consider  his  claims;  where- 
upon Mr.  Wolfe  was  appointed  Chief  Baron.     He  died,  June,  1840. —  M. 

t  Theobold  Wolfe  Tone,  actual  founder  of  the  "  Society  of  United  Irishmen," 
was  born  in  1763;  called  to  the  bar  in  due  course ;  published  a  pamphlet 
against  British  mis-government  in  1790  ;  and  founded  the  above  society  in  1793 
From  that  time, 

11  Per'varios  casus,  per  tot  discrimina  rerum," 
Tone  devoted  himself  to  negotiations  with  the  French  Government  to  send  men 
and  arms  to  win  back  "  Ireland  for  the  Irish."  One  such  expedition,  under 
General  Hoche,  actually  sailed,  but  a  hurricane  dispersed  the  fleet  (consisting 
of  17  sail  of  the  line,  13  frigates,  &c,  with  14,000  soldiers,  and  40,000  stand 
of  anus,  besides  artillery)  before  it  could  reach  Bantry  Bay,  in  the  south  of 
Ireland,  and  the  French  Government  declined  sending  another  large  expedi- 
tion. A  petty  armament  was  despatched,  but  beaten  in  a  contest  with  an  over- 
powering British  fleet.  Tone,  who  had  fought  bravely,  was  captured,  tried  by 
a  Court  Martial,  and  sentenced  to  be  hanged,  which  he  evaded  by  suicide. 
On  the  publication  of  Tone's  autobiography,  seven-and-twenty  years  after  his 
death,  Sheil  attempted  "  to  point  a  [political]  moral"  from  it,  in  one  of  his 
Catholic  Association  Speeches,  and  was  prosecuted  for  it  by  Mr.  Plunket 
then  Attorney-General,  but  never  brought  to  trial. —  M. 


120  FRANCIS   BLACKBURNE. 

in.  the  College  chapel,  and  Mr.  Sergeant  Blackburne,  the  sub- 
ject of  the  present  article,  has  bitten  his  nails  to  the  roots  for 
having,  in  a  moment  of  weakness,  yielded  to  the  solicitations 
of  Master  Ellis,  and  allowed  himself  to  be  debauched  so  far 
from  his  characteristic  prudence  as  to  sign  the  anti-Catholic 
petition. 

I  have  mentioned  this  habit  of  mine  in  order  to  account 
for  my  surprise  at  the  strange  appearance  which  was  exhibited 
not  very  long  ago  by  the  Hall  of  the  Four  Courts,  when  I  was 
struck  by  the  sudden  change  of  aspect  and  of  manner  which 
several  individuals  had,  in  the  course  of  a  few  hours,  under- 
gone. Had  I  been  acquainted  with  the  news  which  had  that 
morning  arrived  in  Dublin,  I  should  not  have  wondered  at  the 
transformation  of  the  loyal  portion  of  the  bar;  but  I  should 
have  been  prepared  for  something  extraordinary,  for,  in  my 
way  to  the  Hall,  I  observed  Mr.  Secretary  O'Gorman  coming 
down  Mass-lane,  and  just  as  he  turned  the  corner,  Mr.  Peter 
.Fitzgibbon  Henchey  (although  Mr.  Saurin  and  the  Chancellor 
happened  at  the  moment  to  be  passing!)  gave  a  look  of  un- 
qualified recognition  to  the  great  plenipotentiary,  which  was 
returned  with  an  air  of  official  affability  which  became  so 
eminent  a  functionary  as  Mr.  O'Gorman. 

The  appearance  of  the  latter  gentleman,  indeed,  was  suffi- 
cient to  intimate  that  some  momentous  incident  had  taken 
place.  Upon  occasions  of  great  importance,  Mr.  O'Gorman  puts 
on  a  pair  of  white  silk  stockings,  striped  with  black,  such  as 
he  observed  to  be  worn  by  Lord  Grey,  when  the  Secretary 
attended  the  Catholic  Deputation.*  The  hosiery  of  the  ultra- 
patriot  Earl  struck  the  fancy  of  Mr.  O'Gorman,  and  ever  since, 
upon  great  occasions,  I  have  observed  a  fac-simile  of  his 
Lordship's  stockings  distended  upon  the  herculean  symme- 
tries of  the  Irish  orator;  and  it  must  be  owned  that,  being  a 
little  spattered,  and  not  much  the  better  for  the  wear,  they 
are  not  a  little  emblematic  of  some  part  of  Lord  Grey's  recent 

*  The  descent  upon  England,  of  O'Connell,  Sheil,  and  others  forming  "  The 
Catholic  Deputation,"  in  the  spring  of  1825,  is  the  subject  of  one  of  the  follow- 
ing Sketches  —  certainly  inferior  to  none  in  personal,  as  well  as  in  political 
Interest.     O'Gorman   was  secretary  to  the  Irish  Catholics. —  M. 


£ETEI£  henchey.  l2l 

parliamentary  conduct.*  The  conjecture  which  I  had  formed 
from  the  Catholic  Secretary's  inferior  habiliments  was  con- 
firmed by  the  cognizance  which  was  taken  of  him  by  Mr. 
Henchey,  who,  although  his  ancestors  were  deprived  of  their 
estates  in  the  county  of  Clare  for  their  creed,  is  now  a  devout 
adherent  to  the  Chancellor's  religion. 

Mr.  Henchey  has  three  manners  of  recognition.  If  he  walk 
to  court,  and  meet  a  junior  counsel,  who  has  held  a  brief  with 
him  in  the  matter  of  Lord  French  a  bankrupt,  this  gentleman, 
who  has  inherited  his  prenomen  from  Lord  Clare,  gives  a  nod 
of  rather  equivocal  intimacy,  in  which  the  consciousness  of  his 
own  consequence  is  not  altogether  merged.  If  Mr.  Henchey 
has  started  on  horseback  from  his  splendid  residence  in  Mer- 
rion-square  (which  was  once  the  town  mansion  of  Lord  Wick- 
low),  with  a  servant  riding  in  gorgeous  livery  on  a  prancing 
palfrey  behind  him,  he  throws  a  casual  look  upon  his  pedes- 
trian brethren,  and  following  those  canons  of  conduct,  which 
Malvolio  lays  down  for  himself  upon  his  anticipated  elevation, 
"  quenches  his  familiar  smile  with  an  austere  regard  of  control." 
But  when  Peter  Fitzgibbon  Henchey,  one  of  his  Majesty's 
counsel  at  law,  seats  himself  in  his  carriage,  and  rolls  in  all 
the  pomp  of  legal  state  along  the  rattling  pavement  of  Nassau 
street,  he  would  be  a  bold  man  indeed,  unless  placed  in  imme- 
diate vicinage  to  the  bench,  who,  by  any  intrusive  salutation, 
should  attempt  to  disturb  Peter's  meditations  on  his  own  dig- 
nity, and  seek  to  attract  an  eye,  that,  bordered  with  deeply- 
pursed  and  half-closed  lids,  seems  to  be  abstracted  from  all 
external  objects,  and  to  have  fixed  itself  in  an  inward  con- 
templation of  the  importance  of  the  eminent  person  in  whose 
solemn  and  mysterious  visage  it  is  awfully  and  profoundly  set. 
Recollecting  the  habits  of  Mr.  Henchey,  when  I  observed  a 
person  hitherto  so  conspicuous  for  his  loyalty,  according  to  the 
sense  attached  by  Lord  Manners  to  the  word,  even  in  the 
presence  of  the  Chancellor,  leaning  from  the  window  of  his 
carriage,  and  suddenly  recovering  his  natural  faculty  of  tele- 
scopic vision,  waving  his  hand  to  the  Secretary  of  all  the  Cath- 

The  late  Lord  Grey's  determined  and  personal  opposition  to  Canning,  the 
liberal  Premier,  in  1827. —  M. 

Vol.  LI.— 6 


122  FRANCIS   BLACKBUEftft. 

olics  of  Ireland  (Mr.  Henchey's  nearest  relatives  inclusive),  I 
concluded  that  something  marvellous  must  have  happened. 

I  entered  the  Hall  of  the  Four  Courts,  and  found  in  the 
looks  of  Barclay  Scriven,  who  was  sitting  on  the  basement  of 
one  of  the  pillars,  a  farther  ground  for  surmise.  A  few  days 
before  he  was  in  the  height  of  hilarity,  when  Master  Ellis  was 
putting  the  anti-Catholic  Petition  into  circulation,  with  the 
assistance  of  a  young  gentleman,  whose  aunt  ex-part  e  pat  erna 
is  the  abbess  of  a  convent.  But  now  Barclay  Scriven  would 
have  furnished  Cruikshank  with  a  model  for  a  burlesque  of 
Ugolino.  He  formed  a  strong  contrast  with  Sergeant  Goold, 
whom  I  observed  tripping  it  on  a  toe  (which,  although  no  longer 
light,  is  still  fantastic),  with  a  renovation  of  his  former  alacrity, 
around  the  Hall.  He  has  been  lately  looking  a  little  autum- 
nal, and  has  fallen  into  the  sear,  the  yellow  leaf.  He  is  no 
longer  what  he  was,  when  he  danced  a  pas-seul  in  the  vagaries 
of  his  youth  at  Fishamble  street;  for  although  he  retains  his 
gracefulness  of  attitude,  he  has  sustained  some  diminution  of 
agility,  and  is  no  longer  so  well  qualified  to  dispute  the  palm 
with  the  "  god  of  dance"  upon  the  stage.  But  now  his  vivacity 
seemed  to  be  in  a  great  measure  restored.  He  looked  as  if  he 
had  been  newly  boiled  in  Medea's  caldron,  or  had  received 
from  Mr.  Godwin  a  recipe  for  everlasting  youth,  and  had 
started  back  some  twenty  years  to  life  again*     I  was  de- 

*  William  Godwin's  striking-  romance  of  "  St.  Leon"  (the  interest  of  which 
turns  on  the  hero  having  obtained  the  elixir  vitce,  which  was  to  give  perpetual 
youth,  and  become  master  of  the  art  of  transmuting  the  meaner  metals  into  gold), 
will  be  recollected,  by  posterity,  when  his  "  Political  Justice"  is  forgotten. 
That  work,  the  boldest  piece  of  republicanism  ever  published  in  England,  made 
Godwin  a  marked  man  during  the  greater  part  of  his  life — long  after  he  had 
laid  politics  aside.  He  published  "  St.  Leon,"  in  1799,  and  wrote  several  other 
works  of  fiction.  He  died  in  April,  1836,  aged  eighty,  and  for  the  last  five 
years  of  his  life,  had  a  competency  from  a  small  sinecure  place  to  which  Lord 
Grey's  Reform  Administration  had  appointed  him. —  Mary  Wolstoncroft  who 
wrote  the  once  famous  "  Vindication  of  the  Rights  of  Women,"  was  his  wife 
(she  had  previously  lived  with  him,  "  on  principle,"  as  his  mistress),  and  died 
in  giving  birth  to  a  daughter,  who  is  known  in  the  world  of  letters,  as  the  wife 
of  Percy  Bysshe  Shelley,  the  poet  (who  was  drowned,  July,  18522),  and  was 
herself  a  distinguished  writer,  as  her  "  Frankenstein"  shows  :  —  she  was  born 
in  1797,  and  died  in  1851.— M. 


CHANGED   ASPECTS.  123 

lighted  at  the  favorable  appearance  in  this  able  and  honest 
man,  who  has  been  uniformly  faithful  to  his  country,  and  nevei 
sacrificed  his  principles  to  his  interests  by  the  abandonment  of 
a  cause  in  which  he  enlisted  in  the  enthusiasm  of  his  youth, 
and  has  since  adhered  to  with  a  constancy  which  no  temptation 
could  ever  disturb. 

The  next  individual  of  note  whom  I  observed  was  Mr.  Ser- 
geant Lefroy.  His  eyes  were  fixed  on  the  ground.  This  was 
not  unnatural,  nor  inconsistent  with  the  angelic  nature,  for  we 
are  told  by  Milton,  that  there  was  a  spirit 

"  Whose  looks  and  thoughts  were  always  downward  hent ;" 

and  who  was  occupied  in  admiring 

"  The  riches  of  Heaven's  pavement,  trodden  gold." 

The  way  to  Heaven,  if  we  may  form  a  conjecture  from  the 
lives  of  the  devout,  would  appear  to  be  composed  of  the  same 
materials  as  its  pavement.  I  at  first  thought  the  Sergeant  was 
engaged  in  his  usual  celestial  occupation  ;  but  looking  more 
attentively,  I  observed  that  the  gloom  of  worldly  solicitude 
was  mixed  with  the  consciousness  of  his  being  in  the  enjo}^- 
ment  of  those  rewards  of  piety  which  are  promised,  in  the  Old 
Testament,  to  the  servants  of  the  Lord.  I  thought  the  pious 
jurisconsult  looked  deeply  melancholy  ;  perhaps  I  was  mis- 
taken, and  he  was  only  revolving  a  point  of  casuistry  for  the. 
approaching  college  election,  and  preparing  to  demonstrate  the 
proposition  which  he  afterward  broached,  that  "no  man  at  an 
election  is  bound  by  a  promise  to  a  candidate,  where  the  safety 
of  religion  is  at  stake." 

I  had  scarcely  passed  this  eminent  theologian,  when  I  saw 
Judge  Moore*  entering  the  Court  of  Common  Pleas,  and,  ob- 
serving in  that  truly  liberal  and  patriotic  judge  (who  has 
approved  himself  on  the  bench  the  foe  to  faction,  consistent 
Math  the  principles  which  rendered  him,  in  the  worst  times,  the 
dauntless  friend  of  Ireland  and  of  Henry  Grattan),  a  joyous 
and  unaccustomed  spirit,  I  concluded  that  something  fortunate 
for  his  country  had  taken  place. 

This  impression   was  strengthened   when   I   noticed   Petei 

*  This  is  not  the  present  Justice  Richard  Moore,  of  the  Queen's  Bencli  — M 


124  FRANCIS   BLACKBURNE. 

Burrowes,  as  he  came  in  an  opposite  direction  into  the  Hall, 
with  that  aspect  of  heart-contentedness  which  he  is  sure  to  mani- 
fest whenever  the  interests  of  Ireland  are  likely  to  be  promoted 
Availing  myself  of  some  acquaintance  with  this  veteran  in  the 
cause  of  Whiggism,  I  advanced  toward  him,  and  inquired 
whether  some  extraordinary  news  had  not  arrived.  Mr.  Bur- 
rowes is  a  remarkably  absent  man,  and  not  having  heard  my 
question,  stood  in  revery  beside  me,  muttering  an  occasional 
word  or  two,  when  I   repeated   my  interrogatory.*     He  was 

*  Peter  Burrowes  was  born  in  1753  and  died  in  1843,  having  reached  the  age 
of  ninety,  retaining  his  mental  faculties  to  the  close.  In  1774,  he  entered 
college,  and  won  a  scholarship,  by  sound  and  varied  learning,  in  1777.  He 
was  a  frequent  speaker  in  the  Historical  Society,  where  his  good  sense  and 
sound  information  were  highly  estimated.  He  was  of  a  sluggish  temperament, 
a  heavy  manner,  and  an  ungainly  person — but  independence  was  to  be  achieved, 
and  he  was  assiduous  and  persevering.  In  1785,  he  was  called  to  the  Irish  bar, 
and  obtained  his  first  honors  in  1791,  as  counsel  for  Sir  Lawrence  Parsons 
(afterward  Earl  of  Rosse  and  father  of  the  astronomer  and  present  President  of 
the  Royal  Society  of  London),  who  had  been  a  candidate  for  the  representation 
of  the  University  and  had  been  defeated,  it  was  averred,  by  Provost  Hutchinson 
unduly  using  his  influence  for  his  own  son.  Continuing  to  win  reputation  at  the 
bar,  Burrowes  did  not  receive  a  silk  gown,  owing  to  an  impression  on  the  part 
of  Government  that  he  was  friendly  to  the  United  Irishmen  —  an  impression 
which  was  not  hastily  removed.  He  finally  obtained  the  honor  and  was  one 
of  fourteen  King's  Counsel  who  signed  a  public  protest,  in  December,  1799, 
against  the  proposed  Union.  He  sat  in  the  last  session  of  the  Irish  Parliament. 
In  1806,  he  received  the  lucrative  appointment  of  Counsel  to  the  Commission- 
ers of  Customs,  but  had  to  resign  it,  when  "  All  the  Talents"  quitted  office. 
His  future  course  was  one  of  hard  labor,  for  his  strong  liberal  opinions  excluded 
him  from  proferment  at  the  hands  of  a  Tory  Ministry.  In  1822,  when  Plunket 
was  made  Attorney-General,  he  had  Burrowes  made  Commissioner  of  the  Insol- 
vent Debtors'  Court,  the  large  salary  of  which  set  him  at  ease  for  the  rest  of  his 
life.  He  eventually  retired  on  a  pension  of  sixteen  hundred  pounds  sterling  a 
year.  He  was  convivial  and  witty  in  private  :  earnest  rather  than  eloquent  at 
the  bar.  Yet,  some  of  his  touches  wei*e  good.  In  one  case,  where  a  man,  who 
had  been  flogged  nearly  to  death  in  1798,  brought  an  action  against  the  High 
Sheriff  who  ordered  the  torture  to  be  inflicted,  when  the  jury  laughed  at  a  jest 
aiising  out  of  the  cruel  details,  Burrowes  indignantly  exclaimed,  "Ay,  gentle- 
men, you  may  laugh,  but  my  client  was  writhing.'''' — In  the  case  of  a  young 
lady  who  had  suffered  the  worst  wrong,  in  1798,  from  a  troop  of  brutal  yeo- 
manry, Burrowes  thus  described  the  victim's  entry  into  Waterford :  "  The 
shades  of  evening  fell,  as  this  young  creature,  foot  sore,  and  alone,  entered  with 
a  palpitating  heart,  that  greatest  of  wildernesses  —  a  great  city."  This  is  simple 
gnd  pathetjc,  as.  well  as  gubjime  in  its  simplicity. —  His  absence   of  rnind  h^S 


PETER    BURRO  WES.  125 

awakened  to  a  perception  of  the  objects  around  him  —  a  finely- 
illuminated  smile  succeeded  the  broad  gaze  of  vacancy  with 
which  his  eyes  were  at  first  fixed  upon  me,  and  he  exclaimed, 
"Why  is  not  Grattan  alive  to-day!" 

I  was  about  to  ask  for  some  more  explicit  information,  when, 
fortunately,  my  friend  Eccles  Outhbert  came  up,  and  having 
an  equal  talent  and  propensity  for  narration,  put  me,  with 
great  clearness  and  volubility,  in  possession  of  the  news,  and 
informed  me  of  the  revolution  in  the  Cabinet.  "In  short," 
said  Mr.  Outhbert  (a  phrase  of  which  this  excellent  Whig  is 
somewhat  inappropriately  fond).  ..But  before  Mr.  Outhbert 
had  concluded  a  sentence  which  commenced  with  this  intima- 
tion of  brevity,  Mr.  Sergeant  Blackburne  walked  by.  The 
moment  I  saw  him,  I  interrupted  Mr.  Outhbert,  and  assured 
him  that,  "  if  I  had  entertained  any  skepticism  with  respect  to 
his  intelligence,  the  aspect  of  the  Sergeant  would  set  all  my 
doubts  at  rest. 

"  Yea,  this  man's  brow,  like  to  a  title-leaf, 
Foretells  the  nature  of  a  tragic  volume." 

The  Sergeant  was  changed  indeed.  A  little  while  before, 
when  the  party  under  whose  banners  he  had  enlisted  himself, 
confidently  anticipated  the  expulsion  of  Mr.  Canning  from  the 
Cabinet,  Mr.  Sergeant  Blackburne  exhibited  as  much  alertness 
as  his  grave  and  sedate  nature  permitted  him  to  wear.     His 

been  mentioned  in  a  previous  note.  On  a  trial  for  murder,  it  was  importaut 
to  the  prisoner  that  the  bullet  found  in  the  wound  should  be  produced.  It  was 
handed  to  Burrowes,  who  was  occasionally  taking-  a  lozenge  for  a  hoarseness. 
In  the  middle  of  his  speech  he  paused,  and  suddenly  exclaimed,  "  O  Lord,  I 
have  swallowed  the  bullet  by  mistake." — He  was  found  shaving  opposite  a  wall 
on  which  there  was  no  mirror.  u  Sir,"  said  the  servant,  who  was  asked  where 
it  was,  "my  mistress  had  it  removed  six  weeks  ago!" — Plunket,  once  at  a 
festive  entertainment,  said,  "  Although  I  am  about  proposing  the  health  of  Peter 
Burrowes,  I  am  not  inclined  to  conceal  his  faults,  much  less  to  describe  him  as 
faultless.  I  will  not  dwell  upon  his  minor  peccadilloes,  but  shall  only  allude 
to  those  by  which  he  is  continually  offending.  I  know  no  man  who  has  more 
to  answer  for.  He  has  spent  his  life  in  doing  acts  of  kindness  to  every  huwan 
being  but  himself.  He  has  been  prodigal  of  his  time,  of  his  trouble,  of  his 
talents,  of  his  money,  to  every  human  being  who  had  or  had  not  a.  claim,  an! 
this  to  the  serious  neglect  of  his  own  interests.  In  short,"  added  Plunket,  "  I 
can  only  account  for  such  an  anomaly  as  this,  by  supposing  him  utterly  destitute 
of  the  instinct  of  selfishness,  ' — tyl, 


126  FRANCIS   BLACKBURNE. 

habitual  composure,  and  the  sort  of  "  wilful  stillness''  which  he 
successfully  entertains,  had  given  way  to  an  unaccustomed 
spirit,  and  it  was  manifest  that  all  his  thoughts  had  been  put 
into  an  agreeable  and  pleasurable  movement.  He  never  wanted 
brilliancy  of  eye ;  but  he  had  been  used  to  subdue  its  expres- 
sion with  a  certain  solemnity  of  aspect,  which  made  him  look 
as  if  he  were  rehearsing  the  part  of  a  judge,  long  before  it 
should  come  to  his  turn  to  perform  the  part.  Thus  he  had 
contrived  to  invest  features,  which,  with  the  exception  of  his 
eyes,  are  rather  of  an  ordinary  cast,  with  an  important  sober- 
ness and  an  aspect  of  not  undignified  meditation.  His  figure, 
although  below  the  common  height,  and  of  broad  and  qua- 
drangular dimensions,  was  stiffened  into  a  kind  of  stunted 
stateliness  that  gave  him  an  imposing  and  somewhat  authori- 
tative deportment.  His  walk  and  gesture  were  always  in 
measure  with  the  march  of  his  steady  and  uniform  mind,  which 
was  never  betrayed  into  any  unseemly  precipitation.  Such 
was  the  ordinary  man  ;  but  he  was  now  entirely  altered.  The 
fire  of  his  eye  had  gone  out ;  his  walk  was  loose,  slouched,  and 
irregular;  restlessness  and  inquietude  were  apparent  in  the 
whole  frame  and  body  of  the  man,  and  dejection,  mingled  with 
the  fretfulness  of  disappointment,  spread  over  his  countenance. 
He  seemed  to  have  been  reduced  an  inch  in  elevation,  and  to 
have  shrunk  back  from  his  artificial  altitude  into  himself. 
How  changed  from  him  who  not  long  before,  amidst  the  orgies  of 
the  corporation,  with  his  cup  overflowing  with  claret,  announced 
himself,  amidst  the  acclamations  of  inebriated  aldermen,  to 
be  the  champion  of  the  church  and  state  !  Peter  Burrowes, 
who  is  full  of  the  milk  of  human  kindness,  though  it  occasion- 
ally turns  a  little  sour,  fixed  upon  him  his  vast  blue  eyes, 
which  would  fitly  provide  a  brace  of  Cyclops  with  the  orbs  of 
vision,  and  exclaimed,  in  his  usual  tone  of  rough  and  hoarse 
benevolence,  "  I  pity  Blackburne  !" 

The  Sergeant's  mistake  in  signing  the  anti-Catholic  Petition 
might  have  excited  the  commiseration  of  Mr.  Burrowes;  but  it 
produced  in  the  public,  on  account  of  its  imprudence,  more 
surprise  than  sympathy.  For  my  own  part,  I  was  not  at  all 
astonished  at  the  last  step  taken  by  Mr,  Blackburne,  because 


JOHN   PHILPOT   OURRAN.  127 

it  was  in  perfect  consistency  with  the  first  which  he  adopted 
when  he  crossed  the  threshold  of  his  profession. 

He  was  called  to  the  bar  about  the  time  that  the  celebrated 
John   Philpot   Ourran  was  made   Master  of  the  Rolls.*      A 

*  When  the  Whigs  came  into  office,  in  1806,  on  the  death  of  Pitt,  they  ap- 
pointed John  Philpot  Curran  to  the  bench,  as  Master  of  the  Rolls,  which  office 
he  held  until  1814,  when  he  resigned,  on  a  pension  of  three  thousand  pounds 
sterling,  and  resided  from  that  time  chiefly  in  London,  where  he  died,  in  1817| 
aged  sixty-seven.  He  was  by  no  means  a  good  equity  judge,  and  considered 
himself  unfairly  used  by  not  being  made  Attorney-General,  for  which  his  famil- 
iarity with  common  law  qualified  him,  and  from  which  office  (had  his  party 
remained  in  power,  which  was  not  the  case),  the  natural  transition  would  have 
been  to  the  Queen's  Bench,  Common  Pleas,  or  Exchequer,  as  Chief  Judge. 
Curran,  bom  in  1750,  of  poor  parents  in  the  County  of  Cork,  was  educated  by 
a  benevolent  clergyman,  named  Boyce  (ever  let  us  record  the  names  of  good- 
doers)  who  strained  his  own  limited  means  to  send  him  to  college  and  get  him 
to  the  bar.  Fortuneless,  and  nearly  friendless,  Curran's  early  struggle,  ere  he 
obtained  law-practice,  was  bitter  and  painful.  But  his  talents  brought  him  on. 
He  entered  Parliament,  and  won  repute  there.  He  was  the  advocate  of  nearly 
all  the  persons  charged  with  political  offences,  during  the  last  eight  years  pre- 
ceding the  Union  (which  he  opposed),  and  his  forensic  eloquence,  on  these 
occasions,  excited  general  admiration.  His  fearlessness  as  an  advocate  injured 
him  at  the  bar,  for  Lord-Chancellor  Clare  let  it  be  seen  that  Mr.  Curran  and 
his  arguments  had  no  favor  with  him,  but  gave  him  immense  popularity.  His 
appeals  to  juries  were  powerful,  beyond  any  conception  which  can  be  formed 
from  his  published,  but  uncorrected  Speeches.  In  one  case,  where  a  clergy- 
man named  Massey  sued  the  Marquis  of  Headford  (an  Irish  peer,  nearly,  but 
not  quite  as  wicked  as  his  almost  namesake,  the  English  Marquis  of  Hertford) 
for  seduction  of  his  wife,  Curran — who  had  himself  sustained  a  similar  wrong 
—  pleaded  so  powerfully  that  the  jury  returned  a  verdict  of  Ten  Thousand 
Pounds  sterling  against  the  "  noble"  Adulterer.  Curran's  conversational  were 
equal  to  his  oratorical  powers.  His  bon  mots  are  widely  known.  Byron,  who 
only  knew  him  in  his  later  years,  when  the  wine  of  life  was  on  the  lees,  chron- 
icled his  impressions  in  bis  private  journal :  "  His  imagination  is  beyond  human, 
and  his  humor  (it  is  difficult  to  define  what  is  wit)  perfect.  He  has  fifty  faces, 
and  twice  as  many  voices,  when  he  mimics.  I  never  met  his  equal."  Again  : 
— "  Curran,  Curran's  the  man  who  struck  me  most.  Such  imagination  !  There 
never  was  anything  like  it."  And,  further  on  :  "  I  have  heard  that  man  speak 
more  poetry  than  I  have  ever  seen  written,  though  I  saw  him  seldom,  and  but 
occasionally." — Curran  was  small  in  statue,  swarthy  in  complexion,  and  with 
an  Irish  face,  in  which  brilliant  eyes  redeemed  everything.  Phillips  thus 
sketches  him,  in  1805,  as  he  appeared  in  the  Hall  of  the  Four  Courts:  "Mark 
well  that  slight,  short  figure,  with  restless  gait,  and  swaying  motion,  and  speak- 
ing gesture — he  with  the  uplifted  face,  protruded  upper-lip,  and  eyes  like  lir 


128  FRANCIS   BLACKBURNE. 

meeting  of  the  bar  was  held  for  the  purpose  of  presenting  to 
Mr.  Ciirran  a  congratulatory  address.  When  this  assembly 
had  been  convened,  and  after  some  of  the  most  eminent  persons 
in  the  profession  had  delivered  their  opinions,  a  young  gentle- 
man drew  upon  himself  the  general  attention  by  coming  delib- 
erately forward  and  opposing  the  motion  to  offer  a  tribute  of 
respect  to  a  man  whose  genius  had  reflected  so  much  honor 
upon  his  country,  and  in  whose  speeches  passages  are  to  be 
found  which  rival  the  masterpieces  of  eloquence  in  ancient  lan- 
guage. It  would  not  have  been  extraordinary  if  some  hoary 
pleader,  actuated  by  political  prejudices  operating  upon  a 
naturally  narrow  mind,  which  had  undergone  still  greater  con- 
traction in  the  inferior  departments  of  the  profession,  had 
opposed  the  tribute  which  it  was  intended  to  offer  to  the  most 
renowned  advocate  at  the  bar :  but  it  excited  no  little  surprise, 
that  a  man  who  was  not  old  enough  to  have  personally  min- 
gled in  the  ferocious  contests  of  the  civil  war  (during  which 
Mr.  Curran  had  displayed  an  intrepidity  which  excited  the 
animosities  of  the  successful  party),  and  whose  mind  ought  to 
have  been  susceptible  of  the  impressions  which  the  eloquence 
of  Mr.  Curran  was  so  well  calculated  to  produce  upon  the 
young  and  sensitive,  should  have  tendered  himself  as  a  volun- 
teer to  the  faction  of  which  that  great  speaker  was  the  antag- 
onist, and  had  earned  his  best  honors  in  their  hate. 

The  boldness  of  this  proceeding  was  quite  sufficient  to  at- 
tract notice.  Every  eye  was  fixed  upon  this  juvenile  and  un- 
known dissentient  from  the  great  body  of  the  bar.  They  saw 
a  formal  and  considerate-looking  person,  with  a  gravity  far 
beyond  his  years,  advance  with  perfect  coolness  and  self-pos- 
session ;   and  while  they  condemn  the  feelings  by  which  he 

ing  diamonds." — Curran  was  fortunate  in  his  biographers.  The  volume,  by 
Mr.  O'Regan,  published  soon  after  his  death,  is  chiefly  anecdotal.  His  son, 
William  Henry  Curran,  wrote  an  excellent  Memoir,  in  two  volumes,  long  out 
of  print,  and  Charles  Phillips'  "Recollections  of  Curran"  (re-cast  and  much 
extended,  in  1850),  supplies  a  vast  quantity  of  information  about  the  man,  his 
times,  and  his  contemporaries. —  The  address  from  the  bar,  on  his  appointment 
as  Master  of  the  Rolls,  mentioned  by  Mr.  Sheil  as  opposed  by  Mr.  Blackburne, 
was  very  brief,  and  while  it  congratulated  him  on  his  jn-omotion,  complimented 
biro  on  the  public  grounds  of  his  ability,  independence,  and  integrity. —  M. 


STARTS    INTO    PUBLIC    LIFE.  129 

was  instigated,  they  could  not  but  perceive  that  he  had  quali- 
fications which  were  calculated  to  raise  him  to  great  eminence 
in  his  profession.  His  enunciation  was  perfect;  every  tone 
was  mellow  and  musical,  and  the  cadences  marking  his  flowing 
and  unelaborated  sentences,  manifested  the  finest  sense  of 
harmony,  and  a  peculiarly  rhythmical  elocution.  To  those 
external  qualities  was  added  an  easy,  round,  graceful,  and 
unstudied  gesture.  '  Although  he  took  the  side  upon  which 
many  angry  and  vindictive  passions  were  marshalled,  yet  he 
betrayed  none  of  the  violence  of  political  detestation.  He  was 
throughout  calm,  sober,  and  subdued,  and  displayed  that  clear- 
ness in  statement,  and  that  faculty  for  methodical  exposition, 
which  have  since  so  much  contributed  to  his  great  success  in 
his  profession.  It  was  painful  to  see  Mr.  Blackburne,  exhibit- 
ing at  the  same  time  so  much  ability,  and  so  little  sense  of  the 
transcendent  merits  of  the  celebrated  person  whose  laurels  he 
endeavored  to  blight.  This  step  was  the  subject,  I  have  heard, 
of  general  comment.  It  was  considered  a  decided  intimation 
of  the  course  in  politics  which  the  young  gentleman  intended 
to  take,  and  his  promotion  under  a  Tory  ministry  was  generally 
anticipated.  This  precocious  disposition  to  sustain  the  "as- 
cendency," might,  to  use  Rosalind's  illustration,  be  compared 
to  a  medlar;  and  it  might  have  been  not  unhappily  said  to 
Mr.  Blackburne,  by  any  lover  of  quotations,  "you  will  be  the 
earliest  fruit  in  the  country  :  for  you'll  be  rotten,  ere  you  be 
half  ripe,  and  that's  the  right  virtue  of  .the  medlar." 

Mr.  Blackburne,  however,  did  not  fulfil  the  anticipations 
which  had  been  formed  in  his  regard,  notwithstanding  this 
unequivocal  intimation  of  his  political  predilections.  He  got 
rapidly  into  business,  and  wisely  dedicated  himself  exclusively 
to  it.  In  a  short  time  his  first  exploit  was  forgotten ;  and  as 
the  Irish  Catholics  are  disposed  to  consider  all  those  who  are 
not  ostensibly  against  them,  as  with  them,  a  notion  crept 
gradually  abroad  that  Mr.  Blackburne  had  leanings  to  the 
liberal  side.  However,  as  he  did  not  interfere,  little  was  said 
with  respect  to  his  political  opinions,  and  his  efficiency  in  his 
profession  caused  both  Catholic  and  Protestant  solicitors  to 
make  large  contributions  to  his  bag.     To  his  admirable  manner 

6* 


130  FRANCIS    BLACKBURNE. 

he  owes  much  of  his  reputation.  He  has  a  finer  voice  than 
any  man  at  the  bar,  and  has  an  ear  so  accurate,  that  the  nicest 
analyzer  of  tones  could  not  detect  the  least  deviation  from  har- 
mony in  his  utterance,  which  is  so  perfect,  that  Doctor  Spray, 
of  Christ  church  Cathedral  [Dublin],  who  was  master  of  the 
science,  used  to  declare  that  he  could  set  his  intonations  to 
music.  The  Sergeant  himself  is  an  excellent  singer,  and 
passionately  fond  of  that  accomplishment  in  others.  It  creates 
no  little  surprise  among  persons  who  are  not  aware  of  his 
being  possessed  of  this  talent,  when,  hearing  on  a  sudden  a 
peculiarly  rich  and  sweet  voice  breathing  in  delightful  tones 
one  of  Moore's  enchanting  melodies,  they  turn  round,  and  find 
in  the  musician  no  other  than  the  grave  and  solemn  person, 
whom  they  may  have  seen  in  the  morning  engaged  in  a  con- 
troversy respecting  the  form  of  a  notice  with  his  Honor  the 
Master  of  the  Rolls. 

But  it  is  not  to  manner  that  the  merits  of  Mr.  Blackburn e 
are  confined.  Although  I  do  not  consider  him  as  by  any 
means  so  ingenious  and  astute  as  Mr.  Pennefather,  who  unites 
almost  every  qualification  which  can  be  desired  in  an  advocate, 
yet  Mr.  Blackburne  is  surpassed  by  no  man  at  the  bar  in  per- 
spicuity ;  and  while  he  renders  subjects  the  most  difficult  and 
entangled,  perfectly  simple  and  clear,  he,  at  the  same  time, 
avoids  a  defect  sometimes  incidental  to  the  talent  for  exposi- 
tion, and  is  by  no  means  lengthy  and  prolix.  It  would  be 
wonderful,  if,  with  these  faculties,  he  had  not  succeeded;  and 
accordingly  in  a  few  years  we  find  him  in  the  foremost  rank  of 
the  Chancery  Bar.  I  have  mentioned  that  he  observed  a 
systematic  abstinence  from  all  political  discussion,  in  the  in- 
terval which  was  employed  in  scaling  the  heights  of  his  pro- 
fession ;  but  shortly  after  the  arrival  of.  Lord  Wellesley  as 
Lord-Lieutenant,  the  extension  of  the  Insurrection  Act  over 
several  of  the  southern  counties,  and  the  provision  contained 
in  that  statute,  that  a  barrister,  holding  the  rank  of  King's 
counsel,  should  preside  over  the  deliberations  of  the  magis- 
trates, brought  Mr.  Blackburne  again  upon  the  political 
stage.  A  most  favorable  opportunity  of  recommending  him- 
self to  Government  was  presented  by  the  refusal  of  Mr.  Penne- 


IN   FAVOR   WITH    LORD   WELLESLEY.  131 

father  to  undertake  the  ungracious  office  of  putting  this  curfew 
law  into  execution  ;  and  Mr.  Blackbnrne  verified  the  maxim, 
that  men  are  often  more  advantaged  by  the  omissions  of  others, 
than  by  any  desert  of  their  own.  Mr.  Pennefather  was  pressed 
by  Government  to  proceed  to  one  of  the  disturbed  districts, 
invested  with  Proconsular  authority;  but  that  gentleman,  not 
liking  the  occupation,  and  being  besides  in  bad  health  at  the 
time,  declined  the  honor  intended  to  be  conferred  upon  him. 
This  refusal  gave,  I  believe,  some  offence,  and  afforded  an 
excuse  for  not  promoting  Mr.  Pennefather  to  the  place  assigned 
to  him  by  the  unanimous  suffrages  of  the  profession. 

An  application  was  made  to  Mr.  Blackburn e  to  undertake 
the  duties  which  had  been  declined  by  Mr.  Pennefather,  and 
the  proposition  was  immediately  acceded  to.  It  were  unjust 
not  to  state  that,  in  this  new  employment  Mr.  Blackburne 
acquitted  himself  in  such  a  way  as  to  give  satisfaction  to  the 
Government  and  to  the  public;  for  while  he  manifested  a 
proper  zeal  in  quelling  insubordination,  he  restrained  the  fero- 
cious passions  of  the  exasperated  gentry,  and  prevented  this 
iron  implement  of  oligarchical  dominion  from  being  converted 
into  the  means  of  gratifying  individual  animosities,  and  pro- 
moting the  sordid  or  tyrannical  views  of  every  needy  or  vin- 
dictive justice  of  the  peace. 

It  is  said  that  Mr.  Blackburne,  not  only  by  his  conduct,  but 
by  his  despatches  to  Lord  Wellesley,  raised  himself  not  a  lit- 
tle in  the  estimation  of  the  Marquis,  and  the  subsequent  inter- 
course between  them  improved  the  impression  which  had  been 
previously  made.  Lord  Wellesley  is  fond  of  the  echo  of  his 
own  voice,  which  comes  back  to  him  in  an  important  reverber- 
ation from  the  halls  of  the  viceregal  palace;  and  Mr.  Black- 
burne, who,  although  a  good  speaker,  has  upon  proper  occa- 
sions a  great  talent  for  silence,  and  has  a  fine  listening  eye,  in 
the  audiences  which  he  gave  Lord  Wellesley,  afforded  that 
distinguished  nobleman  the  best  proofs  of  attachment  to  his 
sovereign,  as  evinced  by  his  admiration  of  his  representative. 
Accordingly,  when  the  office  of  Sergeant  became  vacant,  while 
the  Bar  pointed  to  Mr.  Pennefather  as  best  entitled  to  promo- 
tion, the  Government,  at,  it  is  believed,  the  instance  of  Lord 


132  FRANCIS   BLACKBTJRNE. 

Wellesley,  selected  Mr.  Blackburne.  Although  many  regretted 
that  Mr.  Perm efather,  whose  manners  render  him  as  popular 
as  his  talents  make  him  conspicuous,  had  been  passed  by,  yet 
the  appointment  of  Mr.  Blackburne  gave  satisfaction,  as  he  is 
indisputably  a  person  of  great  merit,  and  has  not  yet  com- 
pletely enrolled  himself  under  the  banners  of  a  faction.  Mr. 
O'Connell,  who  carries  about  him  the  credulity  of  good-nature, 
believed  that  the  new  Sergeant  was  favorable  to  Emancipation, 
and  announced  his  promotion  as  an  auspicious  circumstance  ; 
but  those  who  remembered  his  first  entrance  upon  the  political 
theatre,  did  not  permit  themselves  to  be  so  readily  led  astray. 
An  event  soon  after  occurred,  which  showed  pretty  clearly 
the  bearings  of  Mr.  Blackburne's  inclinations.  At  a  civic  din- 
ner, he  delivered  a  speech,  in  which  he  intimated  his  strong 
Protestant  predilections.*  I  do  not,  however,  attribute  this 
display  of  unanticipated  loyalty  to  any  ebullition  of  feeling 
upon  the  Sergeant's  part.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that,  previ- 
ous to  the  recent  resignation  of  Mr.  Peel  and  the  Protestant 
portion  of  the  Cabinet,  it  wras  rumored,  among  the  circles  of 
their  supporters  in  Ireland,  that  Mr.  Canning  would  be  ejected 
from  power.     This  opinion  gained  ground  every  day,  and  grew 

*  The  mild,  temperate,  and  humane  disposition  of  the  Orange  body  may  be 
surmised  from  the  charter-toast  of  the  association,  drunk  with  great  solemnity 
and  joy,  at  civic  feasts  and  on  the  first  day  of  July  (anniversary  of  the  Battle 
of  the  Boyne)  every  man  kneeling  as  he  repeated  the  words  —  said  to  have 
been  put  together  in  1689.  The  toast  ran  thus :  "  The  glorious,  pious,  and 
immortal  memory  of  the  great  and  good  King  William,  who  saved  us  from 
pope  and  popery,  brass  money  and  wooden  shoes.  He  tbat  won't  drink  this 
toast,  may  the  north  wind  blow  him  to  the  south,  and  a  west  wind  blow  him  to 
the  east;  may  he  have  a  dark  night,  a  lee  shore,  a  rank  storm,  and  a  leaky  ves- 
sel to  carry  him  over  the  feny  to  hell ;  may  the  devil  jump  down  his  throat 
with  a  red  hot  harrow,  that  every  pin  may  tear  out  his  inside ;  may  he  be  jam- 
med, rammed,  and  dammed  into  the  great  gun  of  Athlone,  and  fired  off  into  the 
kitchen  of  hell,  where  the  pope  is  roasting  on  a  spit  and  the  devil  pelting  him 
with  cardinals !"  The  Catholics,  and  liberal  Protestants  who  refused  to  drink 
this  toast,  which  was  a  standing  dish,  late  in  the  evening,  after  the  dinners  of 
Dublin  and  other  Corporations,  were  incontinently  declared,  from  such  recu- 
sancy, to  be  "  bad  subjects."  Not  only  ignorant  yeomanry  and  country  gentle- 
men, but  nobles,  prelates,  and  princes  (for  the  Duke  of  Cumberland  was  Grand 
Master  of  the  Orangemen  !)  used  to  drink  this  toast,  and  swear  to  stand  by  the 
Oi'der  —  when  they  were  too  far  gone  with  drink  to  stand  by  anything-  else,  —  M. 


MS   ANTI-CATHOLIC    DISPLAY.  133 

into  a  sort  of  certainty,  when  the  anti-Catliolic  Petition  was 
presented  for  their  signatures  to  the  bar.  The  crisis  of  Ser- 
geant Blackburne's  fate  had  arrived.  There  is  generally  in 
the  life  of  every  man  some  one  incident  which  is  the  hinge  of 
his  destiny,  and  the  Sergeant  had  touched  that  cardinal  point. 
By  joining  the  Protestant  party,  he  would  have  given  him- 
self, in  the  event  of  their  success  in  the  bold  experiment  which 
was  then  in  contemplation,  a  strong  title  to  their  patronage, 
and  might  ultimately  have  attained  the  highest  honors  which 
it  is  in  the  power  of  Government  to  confer.  He  did  not  resist 
the  allurements  which  were  held  out  to  him;  and,  giving  way 
to  those  original  propensities  which  he  had  manifested  in  the 
early  period  of  his  life,  and  acting  partly  upon  calculation,  in 
an  unluckly  hour  he  attached  his  name  to  Master  Ellis's  pe- 
tition. 

But  for  this  injudicious  step,  it  is  likely  that  Sergeant  Black- 
burne  would  be  Solicitor,  and  in  a  short  time  Attorney-Gen- 
eral, for  Ireland.  Upon  the  former  office  having  become  va- 
cant, his  friends  strongly  insisted  upon  his  pretensions;  but  it 
was  urged,  and  with  great  truth,  that  to  promote  a  decided  and 
avowed  enemy  to  Emancipation,  would  be  at  variance  with  the 
principles  on  which  Mr.  Canning's  administration  was  built, 
and  would  excite  the  indignation  of  the  Catholic  body,  whose 
passions  it  was  so  much  the  interest  of  the  new  Ministry  to  as- 
suage. The  consequence  was,  that  Mr.  Sergeant  Blackbume 
was  put  aside,  and  Mr.  Doherty,  who,  besides  being  the  friend 
and  relative  of  the  Prime  Minister,  is  member  for  the  city  of 
Kilkenny,  was  named  by  the  Cabinet  as  successor  to  Mr.  Joy. 

Sergeant  Blackburne  is  an  eminent  lawyer;*  and  for  calm 

*  The  reputation  of  Mr.  Sergeant  Blackburne  (and  his  strong  political  bias), 
caused  him  to  be  made  Chief  Justice  of  the  Queen's  Bench,  in  which  capacity 
he  presided  over  the  trial  of  Mr.  Smith  O'Brien,  for  high  treason,  at  Clonmel, 
in  1848.  In  1852,  when  the  Earl  of  Derby  formed  an  administration,  he  raised 
Blucklmrne  to  the  Chancellorship  of  Ireland,  for  which  his  former  practice  in 
Eq.iity,  with  the  inclination  of  his  mind  and  the  particular  range  of  his  legal 
acquirements,  had  well  qualified  him.  As  he  was  only  nine  months  in  that 
office,  he  had  little  opportunity  of  "  making  his  mark"  upon  tne  public  mind, 
but  the  clearness  of  his  intellect,  the  extent  of  his  knowledge,  together  with 
bis  patience  and  good  temper  (requirements  so  essential  in  a  judge),  impressed 


J  34:  FHANCIS    BLACKfitJRNE. 

discussion  of  questions  of  equity,  exhibits  in  mind  and  manner 
a  most  happy  aptitude  ■  but  he  never  enjoyed  any  very  con- 
siderable reputation  as  a  public  speaker,  and,  in  addressing  a 
jury  upon  any  topic  of  importance,  as  well  as  in  the  cross- 
examination  of  witnesses,  being  very  inferior  to  Mr.  Doherty, 
is  by  no  means  as  well  qualified  as  that  gentleman  to  render  the 
Crown  efficient  service.  If  any  state-prosecutions  should  be  in- 
stituted, the  accused  would  find  in  Mr.  Doherty  a  far  more  dan- 
gerous assistant  of  the  Attorney-General  than  the  learned  Ser- 
geant. Of  the  fitness  of  the  latter  of  those  two  gentlemen  for 
this  important  office,  I  had  a  recent  occasion  to  form  an  accu- 
rate estimate. 

The  last  assizes  of  Clonmel  [1828]  presented  a  dreadful  mis- 
cellany of  the  most  barbarous  crimes,  most  of  which  were  of  an 
insurrectionary  character,  and  required  the  exercise  of  the 
strongest  powers  of  the  law.  There  were  not  less  than  three 
hundred  and  eighty  prisoners  upon  the  calendar,  from  which 
Judge  Burton  seemed  to  recoil  in  dismay.  The  Government 
felt  that  it  was  necessary  to  do  their  utmost  in  order  to  repress 
so  alarming  a  growth  of  crime;  and  with  a  view  to  the  produc- 
tion of  effect,  and  in  order  to  give  the  administration  of  justice 
more  impressiveness,  deemed  it  advisable  to  send  Mr.  Sergeant 
Blackburne  as  special  counsel  for  the  Crown.  He  accordingly 
arrived  in  Clonmel  at  the  commencement  of  the  Assizes  ;  and, 
as  he  enjoyed  no  ordinary  reputation,  his  mission  had  the  de- 
sired effect,  by  drawing  the  general  attention  to  the  cases  which 
he  conducted. 

I  felt  a  good  deal  of  interest  in  some  of  the  most  important 
of  the  prosecutions,  and  had  a  particular  opportunity  of  observ- 
ing Mr.  Blackburne.  Upon  the  first  day  of  his  appearance  he 
availed  himself  of  the  right  of  the  Crown  to  address  the  jury 
(although  that  privilege  is  denied  to  the  prisoner  against  whom 
a  speech   is   directed  !),  in  order  to  present  a  picture   of  the 

the  legal  profession  who  naturally  can  form  the  truest  opinion  on  such  a 
point,  with  respect  and  admiration.  Mr.  Blackburne  was  offered  a  peerage, 
on  his  appointment,  but  declined  it.  When  the  Derby  Ministry  broke  up,  Mr. 
Blackburne  resigned  office  —  taking  the  usual  retiring  pension  of  four  thousand 
pounds  sterling  a  year.  He  was  succeeded,  in  December,  1852,  by  Mi. 
Mazierc  Brad}  ,  whom  he  had  displaced  nine  months  previously. —  M. 


THE   BURNING   OF   THE   SHEA.S.  i35 

general  condition  of  the  county.  This  was  a  noble  opportu- 
nity for  genuine  eloquence.  The  Lest  materials  that  can  be 
well  conceived  for  a  powerful  harangue  were  gathered  together. 
The  county  was  almost  in  a  state  of  insurrection.  Armed  bands 
of  peasants  traversed  the  country  in  the  open  clay,  and  put  to 
death  in  the  face  of  the  sun  whoever  presumed  to  violate  the 
code  of  regulations  which  they  had  arbitrarily  imposed,  under 
the  authority  of  their  invisible  chieftain,  Captain  Rock.  Du- 
ring the  assizes  themselves,  two  murders  Avere  committed,  and 
Mr.  Lanigan,  the  land-agent  of  Lord  Landaff,  was  fired  at  by 
a  party  of  forty  men.  The  evils  by  which  the  county  was  ac- 
tually afflicted  were  in  themselves  sufficiently  alarming,  with- 
out looking  into  ulterior  results  ;  but  it  Avas  impossible  not  to 
reflect  upon  the  consequences  Avhich  might  ensue  from  the  po- 
litical and  moral  state  of  a  famished  and  ferocious  population, 
provided  with  arms,  regularly  organized,  and  acting  upon  sys- 
tematic principles  of  insubordination. 

Independently  of  the  general  aspect  of  the  county,  Avhich 
opened  such  a  Avide  field  to  a  poAverful  speaker,  the  individual 
case  in  Avhich  he  addressed  the  jury  Avas  one  of  the  most  appal- 
ling that  can  be  imagined,  and  attended  Avith  circumstances  of 
strangeness  as  well  as  of  atrocity,  which  furnished  an  occasion 
for  the  noblest  oratory.  Eighteen  individuals  had  been  burnt 
alive  in  one  of  the  dark  and  lonely  glens  of  the  mountain  of 
Slievenamaun,  and  the  chief  perpetrator  of  that  terrible  deed 
stood  in  all  the  ghastliness  of  guilt  at  the  bar.  The  courthouse 
was  filled  to  suffocation,  by  persons  of  all  classes;  and  the  vast 
assembly,  together  with  the  leading  aristocracy  of  that  opulent 
county,  included  in  all  likelihood  some  of  the  brother-incendia- 
ries of  the  villain  avIio  was  brought  at  last  to  a  tardy  justice. 
The  deepest  silence  prevailed.  The  Judge  himself,  however, 
from  his  judicial  experience  disastrously  familiar  with  scenes 
of  this  kind,  seemed  to  be  aAve-struck  by  the  consciousness  of 
the  important  consequences  of  the  trial,  and  Aveighed  down  by 
the  magnitude  of  the  crimes  over  the  investigation  of  which 
he  Avas  condemned  to  preside.  While  the  oath  Avas  adminis- 
tered to  each  of  the  jury,  every  eye  Avas  riveted  upon  the  indi- 
vidual who  held  the  sacred  volume  in   his  hand.     While  h« 


136  FRANCIS    BLACKBURNE. 

pressed  the  word  of  God  to  Lis  lips,  Lis  countenance  was  closely 
watcLed,  and  it  was  easy  to  perceive  upon  tLe  faces  of  the 
twelve  meiv  upon  whose  concurrent  voices  the  life  of  their 
fellow-creature  was  to  depend,  a  strong  solicitude,  amounting 
almost  to  an  expression  of  fear,  at  the  hazard  winch  they  were 
about  to  incur  by  a  conviction. 

It  was  under  these  circumstances,  and  in  the  midst  of  a  sol- 
emn hush,  that  Mr.  Sergeant  Blackburne  rose  to  address  the 
court;  and  I  do  him  no  wrong  in  stating  that  he  did  not  raise 
himself  to  the  height  of  the  great  argument,  nor  did  he  even 
make  an  approach  to  its  elevation.  He  stated  a  case  fraught 
with  incidents  which  were  enough  to  make  "the  hair  stir  as 
life  were  in't,"  with  a  coolness  and  sang-froid  which  would 
have  become  the  argument  of  a- demurrer  in  the  Rolls.  He 
brought  to  a  court  of  criminal  justice  the  language,  the  gesture, 
and  the  intonations,  to  which  he  had  been  familiar  in  a  court 
of  equity;  and,  in  my  opinion,  his  having  failed  to  produce  a 
deep  impression  arose  from  the  very  qualities  which  render 
him  an  accomplished  advocate  in  another  branch  of  his  pro- 
fession. 

It  may  perhaps  be  thought  that,  feeling  the  injustice  done 
to  the  prisoner  in  cases  of  felony,  by  permitting  the  counsel  for 
the  Crown  to  inflame  the  passions  of  the  jury,  while  the  right 
of  speech  is  denied  to  the  defendant's  advocate,  Mr.  Sergeant 
Blackburne  benevolently  abstained  from  eloquence,  and  from 
motives  of  commiseration  hid  his  brilliant  faculties  under  a 
merciful  mediocrity  and  charitable  commonplace.  I  am  far 
from  thinking  him  capable  of  using  any  undue  efforts  to  pro- 
cure the  conviction  of  any  individual  of  whose  guilt  he  could 
entertain  the  slightest  doubt :  he  is  a  man  of  unimpeached 
probity  and  honor;  but,  while  I  acquit  him  of  any  such  san- 
guinary intent,  it  is  due  to  frankness  to  add  that  he  entered 
into  a  general  view  of  the  state  of  the  county,  and,  by  exciting 
the  alarm  of  the  jury,  enforced  the  necessity  of  making  an  ex- 
ample, and  of  striking  terror  into  the  mind  of  the  populace. 
Perhaps  this  course  was  unavoidable  ;  for  it  is  obvious  that  the 
exercise  of  this  privilege  by  the  counsel  for  tLe  Crown  must 
have  the  effect  of  heating  the  minds  of  tLe  jurors,  and  of  pre- 


AS   CROWN-PROSECUTOR.  137 

paring  them  for  the  reception  of  the  evidence,  with  that  inevi- 
table bias  against  the  prisoner,  arising  from  the  predisposition 
to  convict,  which  an  appeal  to  their  passions  and  an  inculcation 
of  the  necessity  of  repressing  insurrection  can  not  fail  to  create. 
The  humane  and  truly  constitutional  Judge  [Burton]  who  pre- 
sided in  the  criminal  court  at  the  last  assizes  of  Clonmel,  and 
who  brought  with  him  from  England  those  habits  of  justice  by 
which  he  is  distinguished,  was  sensible  of  the  disadvantage 
under  which  the  prisoners  labored,  from  the  causes  to  which  I 
have  referred,  and  appeared  to  me  to  allude  to  Mr.  Blackburne's 
speech,  when  he  told  the  jury  to  discharge  their  minds  of  all 
considerations  excepting  the  evidence  immediately  applicable 
to  the  specific  case  before  them.  I  do  not  think  that  Mr.  Ser- 
geant Blackburne  was  much  more  successful  in  cross-examina- 
tion, to  which  he  is  not  accustomed,  than  in  his  oratorical  dis- 
plays; and  it  was  the  general  impression  of  the  bar  that  the 
Crown  was  indebted  for  the  convictions  which  took  place  to 
the  superior  skill  of  Mr.  Doherty,  in  breaking  down,  as  it  is 
technically  called,  the  witnesses  produced  for  the  defendants. 

In  the  course  of  the  speeches  delivered  by  Mr.  Sergeant 
Blackburne,  in  the  discharge  of  his  functions  as  counsel  for  the 
Crown,  after  a  general  delineation  of  the  character  and  habits 
of  the  county  of  Tipperary,  he  proceeded  to  state  what  he  con- 
ceived to  be  the  causes  of  the  miserable  condition  of  that  pop- 
ulous and  fertile  district,  and  to  point  out  a  remedy  for  the 
evils  by  which  it  is  oppressed.  He  stated  that  the  frightful 
crimes  which  had  been  committed  had  their  origin  in  the  spirit 
of  organization  to  which  the  peasantry  were  inveterately  prone  ; 
and  suggesting  that  the  rigorous  administration  of  justice  was 
adequate  to  the  cure  of  every  evil,  called  upon  the  jury  to  ap- 
ply, what  his  professional  predilections,  in  conformity  with  the 
proverb,  naturally  induced  him  to  consider  of  sovereign  efficacy 
in  removing  all  political  distempers.  There  can  be  no  doubt 
that  the  tendency  of  the  people  to  enter  into  illegal  combina- 
tions is  among  the  ingredients  of  national  calamity,  but  it  is 
far  more  a  consequence  of  remote  influences  than  it  is  an  essen- 
tial and  leading  cause.  Mr.  Sergeant  Blackburne,  in  endeav- 
oring to  discover  the  sources  of  that  deep  stream  of  bitterness, 


138  FRANCIS   BLACKBTJRNE. 

the  wide  and  almost  periodical  inundation  of  whose  waters  has 
produced  so  rank  a  fertility  of  crime,  must  have  made  but  little 
progress  toward  the  fountain-head,  and  mistaken  one  of  the 
branches  of  the  river  for  its  source 

The  most  remarkable  of  the  many  important  cases  in  which 
Mr.  Sergeant  Blackburne  acted  as  leading  counsel  for  the 
Crown,  was  the  trial  of  William  Gorman,  to  which  I  have 
already  referred,  for  "  the  burning  of  the  Sheas."  It  is  by 
that  title  that  the  terrible  crime  in  which  so  many  immolators 
and  so  many  victims  were  involved,  is  habitually  designated  ; 
and  whenever  a  man  expatiates  upon  the  atrocities  which  dis- 
grace the  country,  and  upon  the  conflagrations  by  which  its 
character  is  blackened,  he  refers,  as  to  a  leading  illustration, 
to  "the  burning  of  the  Sheas." 

I  shall  not  readily  forget  the  impression  which  was  produced 
upon  me,  on  my  first  passing  near  the  spot  in  which  that  dread- 
ful incident  took  place,  when  some  of  its  details  were  narrated 
by  one  of  my  fellow-travellers,  in  descending  the  narrow  defile 
of  Glenbower.  The  remains  of  the  habitation  in  which  eigh- 
teen human  beings  were  committed  together  to  the  flames,  are 
not  visible  from  the  road  that  winds  at  the  foot  of  the  mount- 
ain on  which  it  was  situated  ;  but  the  dark  and  gloomy  glen 
in  which  the  deed  was  done,  can  be  pierced  by  the  eye,  when 
the  mists  that  hang  upon  the  lofty  ridge  do  not  envelop  it; 
and  it  is  always  with  awe,  which  is  not  a  little  assisted  by  the 
loneliness  and  dreariness  of  the  scene,  that  the  traveller  turns 
his  eyes  toward  that  dismal  valley,  to  which  his  attention  is 
directed  by  the  habitual  exclamation  which  I  had  never  failed 
to  hear:  "  There  is  the  place  where  the  Sheas  were  burnt!" 
I  had  an  opportunity,  in  consequence  of  having  attended  two 
trials  connected  with  that  frightful  event,  of  learning  the  cir- 
cumstances by  which  it  was  attended  ;  and  as  in  these  sketches 
I  have  not  only  endeavored  to  draw  the  portraits  of  individual 
barristers,  but  also  to  describe  the  character  of  their  occupa- 
tions as  influenced  by  the  nature  of  the  cases  in  which  they 
are  engaged,  an  occasional  account  of  the  most  important  and 
striking  of  those  cases  falls  within  the  scope  of  these  essays, 
and  at  all  events  may  not  be  unattended  with  interest  to  the 


THE    BURNING    OF    THE    SHEAS.  139 

reader.  Passing,  therefore,  from  the  advocate  to  the  prosecu- 
tions in  which  he  was  engaged,  it  will  not  be  inappropriate  that 
I  should  proceed  to  detail  the  incidents  which  attended  "  the 
burning  of  the  Sheas." 

Upon  the  morning  of  the  20th  of  November,  1821,  the  re- 
mains of  the  house  of  Patrick  Shea,  a  respectable  farmer,  who 
held  a  considerable  quantity  of  land  at  the  foot  of  the  mount- 
ain of  Slievenamaun,  exhibited  an  appalling  spectacle.  It  had 
been  consumed  by  fire  on  the  preceding  night;  and  a  large 
concourse  of  people  (the  intelligence  of  the  conflagration  hav- 
ing been  rapidly  diffused  through  the  neighboring  glens)  as- 
sembled to  look  upon  the  ruins.  Of  the  thatched  roof  which 
had  first  received  the  fire,  a  few  smoking  rafters  were/ all  that 
remained.  The  walls  had  given  waj-,  and  stood  gaping  in 
rents,  through  which,  on  approaching  them,  the  eye  caught  a 
glimpse  of  the  dreadful  effects  of  the  devouring  element.  The 
door  was  burnt  to  its  hinges;  and,  on  arriving  at  the  threshold, 
us  awful  a  scene  offered  itself  to  the  spectator  as  is  recorded  in 
the  annals  of  terror.  The  bodies  of  sixteen  human  beings  of 
both  sexes  lay  together  in  a  mass  of  corpses.  The  door  having 
been  closed  when  the  flames  broke  out,  the  inhabitants  precipi- 
tated themselves  toward  it,  and  in  all  likelihood  mutually 
counteracted  their  efforts  to  burst  into  the  open  air.  The  house 
being  a  small  one,  every  individual  in  it  had  an  opportunity 
of  rushing  toward  the  entrance,  where  they  were  gathered  by 
hope,,  and  perished  in  despair.  Here  tli ey  lay  piled  upon  each 
other.  Those  who  were  uppermost  were  burnt  to  the  bones, 
while  the  wretches  who  were  stretched  beneath  them  were 
partially  consumed.  One  of  the  spectators,  the  uncle  of  a 
young  woman,  Catherine  Mullaly,  who  perished  in  the  flames, 
described  the  scene  with  a  terrible  particularity.  With  an 
expression  of  horror  which  six  years  had  not  effaced,  he  said, 
when  examined  as  a  witness,  that  the  melted  flesh  ran  from 
the  heap  of  carcasses  in  black  streams  along  the  floor. 

But  terrible  as  this  sight  must  have  been,  there  was  another 
still  more  appalling.  The  young  woman,  whom  I  have  already 
mentioned,  Catherine  Mullaly,  resided  in  the  house,  and  had 
been  not  very  long  before  married.     She  had  advanced  a  cob- 


140  FRANCIS   BLACKUUENE. 

siderable  period  in  pregnancy,  and  her  child,  which  was  bom 
in  the  flames  in  a  premature  labor,  made  the  eighteenth  victim. 
I  shall  never  forget  the  answer  given  by  her  uncle  at  the  trial, 
when  he  was  asked  how  many  had  perished,  he  answered  that 
there  were  seventeen  ;  but  that  if  the  child  that  was  dropped 
(that  was  his  phrase)  in  the  fire  was  counted,  the  whole  would 
make  eighteen.  His  unfortunate  niece  was  delivered  of  her 
offspring  in  the  midst  of  the  flames.  She  was  not  found  among 
the  mass  of  carcasses  at  the  door.  There  were  sixteen  wretches 
assembled  there,  but,  on  advancing  farther  into  the  house,  in  a 
corner  of  the  room,  lay  the  body  of  this  unhappy  young  creature, 
and  the  condition  in  which  her  child  was  discovered  accounted 
for  her  separation  from  the  group  of  the  dead.  A  tub  of  water 
lay  on  the  ground  beside  her.  In  it  she  had  placed  the  infant  of 
which  she  had  been  just  delivered  while  the  fires  were  raging 
about  her,  in  the  hope  of  preserving  it ;  and  in  preserving  its 
limbs  she  had  succeeded,  for  the  body  was  perfect  with  the 
exception  of  the  head,  which  was  held  above  the  water,  and 
which  was  burned  away.  Near  this  tub  she  wias  found,  with 
the  skeleton  of  the  arm  with  which  she  had  held  her  child 
hanging  over  it !  It  will  be  supposed  that  the  whole  of  this 
spectacle  excited  a  feeling  of  dismay  among  the  spectators; 
but  they  were  actuated  by  a  variety  of  sentiments.  Most  of 
them  had  learned  caution  and  silence,  which  are  among  the 
characteristics  of  the  Irish  peasantry,  and,  whatever  were  their 
feelings,  deemed  it  advisable  to  gaze  on  without  a  comment; 
and  there  were  not  wanting  individuals  who,  folding  their  arms, 
and  looking  on  the  awful  retribution,  whispered  sternly  to  each 
other  that  "  William  Gorman  was  at  last  revenged  !" 

When  information  of  this  dreadful  event  reached  Dublin,  it 
produced,  as  it  was  natural  to  expect,  a  very  great  sensation. 
It  was  at  first  believed  that  "the  burning  of  the  Sheas"  was 
the  result  of  that  confederacy  by  which  the  peasantry  had  reg- 
ulated the  taking  of  lands;  and  that  as  the  previous  tenant, 
one  William  Gorman,  had  been  ejected  by  the  Sheas,  against 
the  will  of  the  people,  the  house  bad  been  set  on  fire.  But  it 
was  asked,  "  What  object  could  there  be  in  destroying  so  many 
individuals  who  were  innocent  of  all  crime,  and  were  mere 


THE    BURNING    OF    THE    SHEAS.  141 

laborers  and  servants  in  tlie  employment  of  the  occupying 
farmer?"  This  reflection,  and  a  wish  to  rescue  the  national 
character  from  the  disgrace  of  so  wanton  an  atrocity,  gradually 
induced  a  surmise  that  the  fire  had  been  accidental;  and  this 
conjecture  was  confirmed  by  the  fact  that,  notwithstanding  a 
large  reward  had  been  offered  for  the  discovery  of  the  incen- 
diaries, no  information  was  given  to  the  Government.  At 
length,  however,  the  fatal  truth  was  disclosed,  and  it  was  ascer- 
tained that  the  conflagration  was  the  result  of  a  plot  executed 
by  a  considerable  band  of  men,  and  that  the  whole  population 
in  the  neighborhood  were  well  aware  both  of  the  project  and 
of  its  execution.  The  first  clew  to  this  abominable  transaction 
was  given  by  a  woman  of  the  name  of  Mary  Kelly. 

This  female  had  been  a  person  of  dissolute  life,  and  had  mar- 
ried a  servant,  who,  having  relinquished  his  employment,  some 
time  after  his  marriage,  established,  with  the  assistance  of  his 
wife,  what  is  commenly  called  a  slicbeen-house,  in  the  vicinity 
of  the  Sheas,  at  the  foot  of  Slievenamaun.  It  was  a  kind  of 
mountain-brothel,  or  rather  combined  the  exercise  of  a  variety 
of  trades,  which,  in  the  subdivision  of  labor  that  takes  place  in 
towns,  are  generally  practised  apart.  Her  husband  stated  that 
he  sold  spirits  without  license  ;  provided  board  and  lodging  to 
any  passengers  who  thought  it  expedient  to  take  up  their 
abode  with  him  ;  and  that  if  a  young  man  and  woman  had  any 
wish  to  be  left  alone  in  his  hospitable  and  accommodating 
mansion  at  a  late  hour  at  night,  he  and  his  wife  did  not  think 
it  genteel  to  meddle  with  their  discourse.  It  will  be  thought 
singular  that,  in  so  wild  and  desolate  a  district,  in  the  midst 
of  solitary  glens  and  moors,  such  conveniences  should  exist; 
but  they  are  not  unfrequent ;  and  one  often  meets  these  traces 
of  civilization  in  parts  of  the  country  which  carry  no  other 
evidence  of  refinement ! 

Mary  Kelly  appears  to  have  superintended  and  conducted 
this  establishment;  her  husband  merely  giving  it  the  sanction 
of  wedlock,  and  joining  in  the  licentious  conviviality  which 
took  place  under  his  auspices.  But  although  his  wife  had,  upon 
her  own  admission,  been  of  profligate  habits,  until  time  had 
transmuted  her,  by  the  ordinary  process,  from  a  harlot  to  a 


112  FRANCIS   BLACKBURNE. 

procuress,  yet  she  does  not  appear  to  have  been  utterly  devoid 
of  all  virtuous  sentiment;  and,  indeed,  the  scene  which  she 
had  witnessed  was  of  such  a  nature  as  to  awaken  any  remnant 
of  conscience,  which  often,  in  the  midst  of  depravity,  is  found 
to  linger  behind. 

A  peasant  of  the  name  of  William  Gorman,  at  whose  trial 
Sergeant  Blackburne  conducted  the  prosecution,  had  originally 
held  the  house  where  the  Sheas  resided.  He  was  their  under- 
tenant, and  held  the  lowest  place  in  those  numerous  gradations 
of  tenure  into  which  almost  every  field  is  divided  and  subdi- 
vided ;  for  the  Sheas  were  not  middle-men  in  the  strict  sense 
of  the  word,  but  stood  themselves  at  a  great  distance  from  the 
head-proprietor  of  the  estate,  although  they  were  the  immedi- 
ate landlords  of  Gorman.  The  more  remote  the  head-landlord, 
the  heavier  the  weight  with  which  oppression  falls  on  the  oc- 
cupier of  the  soil.  The  owner  of  the  fee  presses  his  lessee ; 
the  latter  comes  down  upon  the  tenant,  who  derives  from  him, 
who,  in  his  turn,  crushes  his  own  immediate  serf;  and  if,  which 
often  happens  in  this  long  concatenation  of  vassalage,  there 
are  many  other  interventions  of  estate,  the  occupier  of  the  soil 
is  in  proportion  made  to  suffer;  and  is,  to  use  the  expression 
of  Lord  Clare,  "  ground  to  powder,"  in  this  complicated  system 
of  exaction  !  William  Gorman  was  dealt  with  most  severely. 
He  was  distrained,  sued  in  the  superior  courts,  processed  by 
civil  bill  —  in  short,  the  whole  machinery  of  the  law  was  put 
into  action  against  him.  Driven  from  his  home,  deprived  of 
his  few  fields,  without  covert  or  shelter,  he  made  an  appeal  to 
the  league  of  peasants  with  whom  he  was  associated ;  and,  as 
the  Sheas  had  infringed  upon  their  statutes,  it  was  determined 
that  they  should  die,  and  that  an  exemplary  and  appalling 
vengeance  should  be  taken  of  them. 

I  saw  William  Gorman  at  the  bar  of  the  court  in  which  he 
was  condemned.  He  heard  the  whole  detail  of  the  atrocities 
of  which  he  had  been  the  primary  agent.  He  was  evidently 
most  solicitous  for  the  preservation  of  life;  yet  the  expression 
of  anxiety  which  disturbed  his  ghastly  features  occasionally 
gave  way  to  the  exulting  consciousness  of  his  revenge;  and, 
as  he  heard  the  narration  of  his  own  delinquencies,  so  far  fvom 


THE   BURNING   OF   THE   SHEAS.  113 

intimating  contrition  or  remorse,  a  savage  joy  flashed  over  his 
face  ;  Lis  eyes  were  lighted  up  with  a  fire  as  lurid  as  that  which 
lie  had  kindled  in  the  habitation  of  his  enemies;  his  hand, 
which  had  previously  quivered,  and  manifested,  in  the  irregu- 
lar movement  of  his  fingers,  the  workings  of  deep  anxiety,  be- 
came, for  a  moment,  clinched ;  and  Avhen  the  groans  of  big 
victims  were  described,  his  white  teeth,  which  were  unusually 
prominent,  were  bared  to  the  gums;  and,  though  he  had 
drained  the  cup  of  vengeance  to  the  dregs,  still  he  seemed  to 
smack  his  lips,  and  to  lick  the  blood  with  which  his  injuries 
had  been  redressed  ! 

This  man  had  the  vindictive  feelings  of  a  savage ;  but,  while 
his  barbarities  admit  of  no  sort  of  extenuation,  they  still  were 
not  without  a  motive.  His  co-partners  in  villany,  however, 
who  arranged  and  conducted  the  enterprise,  had  no  instigation 
of  personal  vengeance,  toward  the  oppressors  of  William  Gor- 
man. At  their  head  was  a  bold  and  sagacious  ruffian,  whose 
name  was  Maher.  It  was  determined  that  their  plot  should 
be  carried  into  execution  on  Monday,  the  20th  of  November. 
On  the  preceding  Saturday,  Maher  went  to  Mary  Kelly's 
house,  and  retired  to  a  recess  in  it,  where  he  employed  himself 
in  melting  lead,  and  fusing  it  into  balls.  He  was  supposed  to 
be  a  paramour  of  Mary  Kelly  (though  she  strenuously  denied 
it),  and  she  was  certainly  familiar  with  him.  She  had  heard 
(indeed,  it  was  known  through  the  whole  of  that  wild  vicinage) 
that  it  was  intended  to  inflict  summary  justice  upon  the  Sheas; 
and  being  well  aware  that  Maher  was  likely  to  dip  his  hands 
in  any  bloody  business  which  was  to  go  on,  and  observing  his 
occupation,  which  he  did  not  seek  to  hide  from  her,  she  taxed 
him  with  his  "slaughterous  thoughts,"  and  having  some  good 
instincts  left,  begged  him  not  to  take  life  away.  Maher  an- 
swered with  equivocation. 

During  this  colloquy,  Catherine  Mullaly,  a  cousin  of  Mary 
Kelly,  came  into  the  house.  Maher  was  well  acquainted  with 
her,  and  had  the  rude  gallantry  which  is  common  among 
Irish  peasantry.  She  resided  as  a  servant  with  the  Sheas. 
Maher  believed  that  there  were  arms  in  the  Sheas'  possession, 
and  knew  that  there  were  a  number  of  persons  living  in  the 


144  FRANCIS   BLACKBURNE. 

house,  with  a  view  to  their  defence.  The  extent,  however,  of 
their  means  of  self-protection  the  murderers  had  not  ascer- 
tained, and  it  was  important  to  learn  the  fact,  in  order  that 
they  might  adapt  to  circumstances  their  mode  of  attack.  It 
is  probable,  that,  if  there  had  been  no  weapons  in  the  house, 
the  conspirators  would  have  burst  open  the  door,  dragged  the 
Sheas  out,  and  put  them  to  death,  and  would  have  spared  the 
more  unoffending  victims  :  but  having  discovered  that  there 
were  firearms  in  abundance,  they  considered  the  burning  of 
the  house  as  a  measure  of  self-defence,  independently  of  the 
impression  which  a  massacre  upon  a  large  scale  would  be  likely 
to  produce.  Maher,  therefore,  sought  to  ascertain  the  state  of 
defence  from  Catherine  Mullaly,  and  entered  into  conversation 
with  her  in  the  tone  of  mixed  joke  and  gibe,  of  which  the 
lower  orders,  who  delight  in  repartee,  are  exceedingly  fond. 
The  young  woman  was  pleased  with  his  attentions,  and  in  the 
innocence  of  her  heart,  not  having  any  suspicion  of  his  intent, 
gradually  disclosed  to  him  that  there  was  a  quantity  of  arms 
in  the  house.  Maher,  on  her  departure,  put  on  her  cloak,  and 
bade  her  farewell  in  the  tone  of  friendship.  Mary  Kelly,  who 
knew  him  well,  and  guessed  at  his  object,  the  moment  Cathe- 
rine Mullaly  Avas  gone  (for  she  did  not  dare  to  speak  in  her 
presence)  implored  Maher,  whatever  he  might  intend,  not  to 
harm  Catherine  Mullaly. 

She  extorted  a  promise  from  him  to  that  effect,  on  which 
she  relied  for  the  moment,  and  they  separated;  Maher  with 
his  balls,  and  Mary  Kelly  with  the  undertaking  for  the  life  of 
Catherine  Mullaly,  in  which  she  placed  »so  mistaken  a  confi- 
dence. After  some  reflection,  hoAvever,  her  alarm  for  the 
safety  of  her  relative,  to  whom  she  was  much  attached,  revived, 
and  during  the  next  day  her  suspicions  were  increased  by  the 
notes  of  preparation  which  she  observed  between  Maher  and 
his  confederates.  However,  she  did  not  venture  to  speak  ;  for, 
to  use  her  own  phrase,  "  a  word  would  have  been  as  much  as 
her  life  was  worth  ;"  still  a  terrible  inquietude  preyed  upon 
her,  and,  as  if  actuated  by  some  mysterious  impulse,  upon 
Monday  night,  when  her  husband,  to  whom  she  never  com- 
munipated   her  apprehensions,   was   asleep,   she  silently  rose 


THE  BURNING  OF  THE  SHEAS.  14:5 

from  bed,  and  having  huddled  on  his  coat,  left  her  cabin, 
though  it  was  near  midnight,  and  advanced  cautiously  and 
slowly  along  the  hedges,  until  she  made  her  way  to  near 
Maher's  house.  She  stopped,  and  heard  the  voices  of  men 
engaged  in  discussion,  which  lasted  some  time;  at  length  the 
door  opened  —  she  hid  herself  behind  some  brambles,  and 
bending  down,  in  order  to  avoid  detection,  which  would  have 
been  death,  she  marked  the  murderers  as  they  came  forth. 
They  issued  from  Maher's  house  in  arms,  and  walked  in  a  sort 
of  array,  advancing  in  file.  Eight  of  them  she  knew;  and,  as 
she  alleged,  distinctly  recognised  them  by  their  voices  and 
looks.  One  of  them  carried  two  pieces  of  turf,  lighted  at  the 
extremities,  and  kept  the  fire  alive  with  his  breath. 

They  passed  her  without  observation,  and  proceeded  upon 
their  dreadful  destination.  Trembling  and  terror-struck,  but 
still  impelled  to  pursue  them,  she  followed  on  from  hedge  to 
hedge,  until  they  got  beyond  her;  and  perceiving  that  they 
proceeded  toward  the  house  of  the  Sheas,  she  stopped  at  a 
spot  from  which  the  house  was  visible,  and  by  which  the 
murderers,  after  executing  their  diabolical  purpose,  afterward 
returned.  Here  she  remained  in  terrible  anticipation,  and  her 
conjecture  was  speedily  verified.  A  fire  suddenly  appeared 
in  the  roof  of  Shea's  house  ;  the  wind  high,  it  rose  rapidly  into 
a  flame,  and  the  whole  was  speedily  in  a  blaze.  It  cast  round 
the  rocky  glen  a  frightful  splendor,  and  furnished,  in  its  exten- 
sive diffusion  of  light,  the  means  of  beholding  all  that  took 
place  close  to  the  burning  cottage,  in  which  shrieks  and  cries 
for  mercy  began  to  be  heard.  The  murderers  had  secured  the 
door ;  and  having  prevented  all  possibility  of  escape,  stood  in 
groups  about  the  house,  and  gazed  on  the  progress  of  the  con- 
flagration. So  far  from  being  moved  to  pity,  they  answered 
the  invocations  of  their  victims  with  yells  of  ferocious  laughter. 
They  set  up  a  war-whoop  of  exultation,  and,  in  token  of  tri- 
umph, discharged  their  guns  and  blunderbusses  to  celebrate 
their  achievement.  There  was  an  occasional  pause  in  their 
shouts :  nothing  then  was  heard  but  the  crackling  of  the 
flames,  that  shed  far  and  wide  their  desolate  illumination;  and 
the  spectatress  of  this  dreadful  scene,  though  at  some  distance 

Yol.  II,— 7 


14:6  FRANCIS    BLACKBUftNE. 

from  it,  declared  that,  in  the  temporary  abatement  of  the  wind, 
and  the  cessation  of  its  gusts,  she  could  at  intervals  hear  the 
deep  groans  of  the  dying,  and  the  gulps  of  agony  with  which 
their  tortures  were  concluding. 

But  the  fiends  by  whom  these  infernal  fires  were  kindled, 
soon  reiterated  their  cries  of  exultation,  and  discharged  their 
guns  again.  The  report  of  their  firearms,  which  was  taken 
up  by  the  echoes  of  the  mountain,  produced  a  result  which 
they  had  not  anticipated.  On  the  opposite  side  of  a  hill  which 
adjoined  the  house,  there  resided  a  man  of  the  name  of  Philip 
Dillon,  who  was  at  friend  of  the  Sheas.  Hearing  the  discharge 
of  guns,  and  suspecting  what  had  taken  place,  he  summoned 
as  many  as  he  could  gather  together,  and  proceeded  at  their 
head  across  the  hill,  in  order,  if  possible,  to  save  the  Sheas. 
They  advanced  toward  the  house,  but  arrived  too  late  :  neither 
had  they  courage  to  attack  the  murderers,  who  at  once  drew 
up  before  the  flames  to  meet  them.  Philip  Dillon,  indeed, 
defied  them  to  come  on,  but  they  declined  his  challenge,  and 
waited  his  attack,  which,  as  his  numbers  were  inferior,  he 
thought  it  prudent  not  to  make.  Both  parties  stood  looking 
at  each  other,  and  in  the  meanwhile  the  house  continued  to 
blaze.  The  groans  were  heard  for  a  little  time,  until  they 
grew  fainter  and  fainter;  and  at  length  all  was  silent. 

Although  the  arrival  of  Philip  Dillon  did  not  contribute  to 
save  any  of  the  sufferers,  still  it  was  the  means  of  convicting 
William  Gorman,  by  affording  a  corroboration  to  the  testimony 
of  Mary  Kelly.  John  Butler,  a  boy,  who  was  in  the  employ- 
ment of  Philip  Dillon,  and  accompanied  him  to  the  burning 
house,  was  the  brother  of  one  of  the  servants  of  the  Sheas. 
Notwithstanding  he  could  not  give  any  assistance  to  his 
brother,  yet  his  anxiety  to  discover  the  murderers  induced  him 
to  approach  nearer  than  his  companions  to  the  flames,  when, 
by  the  fire  which  they  had  kindled,  Butler  had  an  opportunity 
of  identifying  William  Gorman,  against  whom  he  gave  his 
testimony,  and  thus  sustained  the  evidence  of  Mary  Kelly. 

All  was  now  over — the  roof  had  fallen  in,  and  the  ruins  of 
the  cottage  were  become  a  sepulchre.  Gorman  and  Maher, 
with  their  associates,  left  the  scene  of  their  atrocities,  and 


TME   BtJRNING  OF   TtfE   SHEiS.  14? 

returned  by  the  same  path  by  which  they  had  arrived.  An- 
other eye,  however,  besides  that  of  God,  was  upon  them. 
They  passed  a  second  time  near  the  place  where  Mary  Kelly 
lay  concealed  ;  again  she  cowered  at  their  approach  ;  and,  as 
they  went  by,  had  a  second  opportunity  of  identifying  them. 
Here  a  circumstance  took  place  which  is,  perhaps,  more  utterly 
detestable  than  any  other  which  I  have  yet  recorded.  The 
conversation  of  the  murderers  turned  upon  the  doings  of  the 
night,  and  William  Gorman  amused  the  party  by  mimicking 
the  groans  of  the  dying,  and  mocking  the  agonies  which  he 
had  inflicted. 

The  morning  now  began  to  break,  and  Mary  Kelly,  haggard, 
affrighted,  and  laden  with  the  dreadful  knowledge  of  what 
had  taken  place,  returned  to  her  home.  Well  aware,  however, 
of  the  consequences  of  any  disclosure,  she  did  not  utter  a  syl- 
lable to  her  husband,  or  to  her  son,  upon  the  subject;  and 
although  examined  next  day  before  a  magistrate,  who  con- 
jectured, from  the  ill-fame  of  her  house,  that  she  must  have 
had  some  cognizance  of  what  had  taken  place,  she  declared 
herself  to  be  innocent  of  all  knowledge.  John  Butler,  too, 
who  had  witnessed  the  death  of  his  brother,  immediately  pro- 
ceeded to  the  house  of  his  mother,  Alicia  Butler,  an  old  woman, 
who  was  produced  as  a  witness  for  the  crown;  he  awoke  her 
from  sleep,  and  told  her  that  her  son  had  been  burned  alive. 
Her  maternal  feelings  burst  into  an  exclamation  of  horror 
upon  first  hearing  this  dreadful  intelligence;  but,  instead  of 
immediately  proceeding  to  a  magistrate,  she  enjoined  her  son 
not  to  speak  on  the  subject,  lest  she  herself,  and  all  her  family, 
should  suffer  the  same  fate. 

For  sixteen  months,  no  information  whateATer  was  communi- 
cated to  Government.  Mary  Kelly  was  still  silent,  and  did  not 
dare  to  reproach  Maher  with  the  murder  of  Catherine  Mullaly, 
for  whose  life  she  had  made  a  stipulation.  She  did  not  even 
venture  to  look  in  the  face  of  the  murderer,  although,  when  he 
visited  at  her  house,  which  he  continued  to  do,  she  could  not 
help  shuddering  at  his  presence.  Still  the  deeds  which  she 
had  seen  were  inlaid  and  burned  in  dreadful  colors  in  her 
mind.     The  recollection  of  the  frightful  spectacle  never  left 


l48  FRANCIS   £LACKBURN£. 

her.  She  became  almost  incapable  of  sleep  ;  and,  haunted  by 
images  of  horror,  used  in  the  dead  of  night  to  rise  from  her 
bed,  and  wander  over  the  lonely  glen  in  which  she  had  seen 
such  sights;  and  although  one  would  have  supposed  that  she 
would  have  instinctively,  fled  from  the  spot,  she  felt  herself 
drawn  by  a  kind  of  attraction  to  the  ruins  of  Shea's  habitation, 
where  she  was  accustomed  to  remain  till  the  morning  broke, 
and  then  return  wild  and  wan  to  her  home.  She  stated,  when 
examined  in  private  previous  to  the  trial  in  Avhich  she  gave 
her  evidence,  that  she  was  pursued  by  the  spectre  of  her  unfor- 
tunate kinswoman,  and  that  whenever  she  lay  down  in  her 
bed,  she  thought  of  the  "burning,"  and  felt  as  if  Catherine 
Mullaly  was  lying  beside  her,  holding  her  child,  "  as  black,  as 
a  coal,  in  her  arms."  At  length  her  conscience  got  the  better 
of  her  apprehensions,  and  in  confession  she  revealed  her  secret 
to  a  priest,  who  prevailed  upon  her  to  give  information,  which, 
after  a  struggle,  she  communicated  to  Captain  Despard,  a  jus- 
tice of  the  peace  for  the  county  of  Tipperary. 

Such  were  the  incidents  which  accompanied  the  perpetration 
of  a  crime,  than  which  it  is  difficult  to  imagine  one  more  enor- 
mous. To  do  the  people  justice,  immediately  after  the  con- 
viction and  execution  of  William  Gorman,  they  appeared  to 
feel  the  greatest  horror  at  his  guilt;  and  of  that  sentiment  a 
Roman  Catholic  assembly,  held  during  the  assizes,  afforded  a 
strong  proof.  The  assizes  had  gathered  an  immense  con- 
course of  the  lower  orders  from  all  parts  of  the  country,  and 
Mr.  Sheil,  conceiving  that  a  favorable  opportunity  had  pre- 
sented itself  for  giving  a  salutary  admonition  to  the  people, 
and  believing  that  his  advice  would  be  fully  as  likely  to  pro- 
duce an  impression  as  the  Protestant  declamation  of  Mr.  Ser- 
geant Blackburne,  used  his  influence  in  procuring  a  public 
meeting  to  be  summoned.  A  vast  multitude  thronged  to  the 
place  of  assembly  ;  and  I  am  bestowing  no  sort  of  encomium 
upon  Mr.  Sheil,  when  I  say  that  his  speech  produced  a  great 
deal  of  effect  upon  the  peasantry,  for  the  bare  statement  of  the 
facts  which  appeared  in  evidence  in  the  course  of  the  assizes, 
would  have  been  sufficient  to  awaken  deep  emotions  Avherever 
the  instincts  of  humanity  were  not  utterly  extinguished.     As 


THE  BURNING  OF  THE  SHEAS. 


14$ 


Mr.  Shell's  address  contained  a  summary  of  the  principal  cases 
in  which  Sergeant  Blackburne  was  engaged,  and  he  dwelt 
especially  upon  that  of  Matthew  Hogan,  which  was  attended 
by  many  afflicting  circumstances,  I  shall  close  this  article  by  a 
citation  from  the  concluding  passages  of  that  gentleman's 
speech.  "  The  recollection,"  he  continued,  "  of  what  I  have 
seen  and  heard  during  the  present  assizes,  is  enough  to  freeze 
the  blood.  Well  might  Judge  Burton,  who  is  a  good  and 
tender-hearted  man  —  well  might  he  say,  with  tears  in  his 
eyes,  that  he  had  not  in  the  course  of  his  judicial  experience 
beheld  so  frightful  a  mass  of  enormities  as  the  calendar  pre- 
sented. How  deep  a  stain  have  those  misdeeds  left  upon  the 
character  of  your  county,  and  what  efforts  should  not  be  made 
by  every  man  of  ordinary  humanity,  to  arrest  the  progress  of 
villany,  which  is  rolling  in  a  torrent  of  blood,  and  bearing 
down  all  the  restraints  of  law,  morality,  and  religion,  before  it. 
Look,  for  example,  at  the  murder  of  the  Sheas,  and  tell  me  if 
there  be  anything  in  the  records  of  horror  by  which  that 
accursed  deed  has  been  excelled  !  The  unborn  child,  the  little 
innocent  who  had  never  lifted  its  innocent,  hands,  or  breathed 
the  air  of  heaven  —  the  little  child  in  its  mother's  womb  ...  I 
do  not  wonder  that  the  tears  which  flow  down  the  cheeks  of 
many  a  rude  face  about  me  should  bear  attestation  to  your 
horror  of  that  detestable  atrocity.  But  I  am  wrong  in  saying 
that  the  child  who  perished  in  the  flames  was  not  born.  Its 
mother  was  delivered  in  the  midst  of  the  flames.  Merciful 
God  ?  Born  in  fire  !  Sent  into  the  world  in  the  midst  of  a 
furnace  !  transferred  from  the  womb  to  the  flames  that  raged 
round  the  agonies  of  an  expiring  mother !  There  are  other 
mothers  who  hear  me.  This  vast  assembly  contains  women, 
doomed  by  the  primeval  malediction  to  the  groans  of  child- 
birth, which  can  not  be  suppressed  on  the  bed  of  down,  into 
which  the  rack  of  maternal  agony  still  finds  its  way.  But  say, 
you  who  know  it  best,  you  who  are  of  the  same  sex  as  Cathe- 
rine Mullaly,  what  must  have  been  the  throes  with  which  she 
brought  forth  her  unfortunate  offspring,  and  felt  her  infant 
consumed  by  the  fires  with  which  she  was  surrounded  !  We 
can  but  lift  up  our  hands  to  the  God  of  justice,  and  ask  him 


150  FKANCIS    BLACKBtmmi!. 

why  lias  lie  invested  ns  with  the  same  forms  as  the  demons 
who  perpetrated  that  unexampled  murder  !  And  why  did  they 
commit  it? — by  virtue  of  a  horrible  league  by  which  they 
were  associated  together,  not  only  against  their  enemy,  but 
against  human  nature  and  the  God  who  made  it ! — for  they 
were  bound  together  —  they  were  sworn  in  the  name  of  their 
Creator,  and  they  invoked  Heaven  to  sanctify  a  deed  which 
they  were  confederated  to  perpetrate  by  a  sacrament  of  Hell. 
Although  accompanied  by  circumstances  of  inferior  terror,  the 
recent  assassination  of  Barry  belongs  to  the  same  class  of  guilt. 
A  body  of  men  at  the  close  of  day  enter  a  peaceful  habitation, 
on  the  Sabbath,  and  regardless  of  the  cry  of  a  frantic  woman, 
who,  grasping  one  of  the  murderers,  desired  him  '  to  think  of 
God,  and  of  the  blessed  night,  and  to  spare  the  father  of  her 
eight  children!'  dragged  him  forth,  and  -when  he,  'offered  to 
give  up  the  ground  tilled  and  un  tilled  if  they  gave  him  his 
life,'  answered  him  with  a  yell  of  ferocious  irony,  and  telling 
him  '  he  should  have  ground  enough,'  plunged  their  bayonets 
into  his  heart!  An  awful  spectacle  was  presented  on  the 
trial  of  the  wretched  men  who  were  convicted  of  the  assassina- 
tion. At  one  extremity  of  the  bar  there  stood  a  boy,  with  a 
blooming  face  and  with  down  on  his  cheek,  and  at  the  other 
an  old  man  in  the  close  of  life,  with  a  wild  haggard  look,  a 
deeply-furrowed  countenance,  and  a  head  covered  with  hoary 
and  dishevelled  hair.  In  describing  the  frightful  scene  it  is 
consoling  to  find  that  you  share  with  me  in  the  unqualified 
detestation  which  I  have  expressed ;  and,  indeed,  I  am  con- 
vinced that  it  is  unnecessary  to  address  to  you  any  observation 
on  the  subject. 

"  But,  my  good  friends,  I  must  call  your  attention  to  another 
trial,  I  mean  that  of  the  Hogans,  which  affords  a  melancholy 
lesson.  That  trial  was  connected  with  the  insane  practice 
which  exists  among  you,  of  avenging  the  accidental  affronts 
offered  to  individuals,  by  enlisting  whole  clans  in  the  quarrel 
and  waging  an  actual  war,  which  is  carried  on  by  sanguinary 
battles.  I  am  very  far  from  saying  that  the  deaths  which 
occur  in  these  barbarous  feuds  are  to  be  compared  with  the 
guilt  of  preconcerted  assassination,  but  that  they  are  accom 


Mtt.  sheil's  speech  to  THE  PEOPLE.  151 

panied  with  deep  criminality  there  can  be  no  question  :  the 
system,  too,  which  produces  them,  is  as  much  marked  with 
absurdity  as  it  is  deserving  of  condemnation.  In  this  county, 
if  a  man  chances  to  receive  a  blow,  instead  of  going  to  a  magis- 
trate to  swear  informations,  he  lodges  a  complaint  with  his 
clan,  which  enters  into  a  compact  to  avenge  the  insult  —  a 
reaction  is  produced,  and  an  equally  extensive  confederacy  is 
formed  on  the  other  side.  All  this  results  from  an  indisposition 
to  resort  to  the  law  for  protection  ;  for  among  you  it  is  a  point 
of  honor  to  avoid  magistrates,  and  to  reject  all  the  legitimate 
means  provided  for  your  redress.  The  battle  fought  between 
the  Hickeys  and  the  Hogans,  in  which  not  less  than  five  hun- 
dred men  were  engaged,  presents  in  a  strong  light  the  conse- 
quences of  this  most  strange  and  preposterous  system.  Some 
of  the  Hickey  party  were  slain  in  the  field,  and  four  of  the 
Hogans  were  tried  for  their  murder: — they  were  found  guilty 
of  manslaughter  —  three  of  them  are  married  and  have  families, 
and  from  their  wives  and  children  are  condemned  to  separate 
for  ever.  In  my  mind,  these  unhappy  men  have  been  doomed 
to  a  fate  still  more  disastrous  than  those  who  have  perished  on 
the  scaffold.  In  the  calamity  which  has  befallen  Matthew 
Hogan  every  man  in  court  felt  a  sympathy.  With  the  excep- 
tion of  his  having  made  himself  a  party  in  the  cause  of  his 
clan,  he  has  always  conducted  himself  with  propriety.  His 
landlord  felt  for  him  not  only  an  interest,  but  a  strong  regard, 
and  exerted  himself  to  the  utmost  in  his  behalf.  He  never 
took  a  part  in  deeds  of  nocturnal  villany.  He  does  not  bear 
the  dagger  and  the  torch  ;  honest,  industrious,  and  of  a  mild 
and  kindly  nature,  he  enjoyed  the  good  will  of  every  man  who 
Avas  acquainted  with  him.  His  circumstances  in  the  world 
were  not  only  comparatively  good,  but,  when  taken  in  refer- 
ence to  his  condition  in  society,  were  almost  opulent;  and  he 
rather  resembled  an  English  yeoman  than  an  Irish  peasant. 
His  appearance  at  the  bar  was  in  a  high  degree  moving  and 
impressive  —  tall,  athletic,  and  even  noble  in  his  stature,  with 
a  face  finely  formed,  and  wholly  free  from  any  ferocity  of 
expression,  he  attracted  every  eye,  and  excited,  even  among 
his  prosecutors,  a  feeling  of  commiseration.      He   formed   a 


152  FRANCIS   BLACKBTJRNE. 

remarkable  contrast  with  the  ordinary  class  of  culprits  who  are 
arraigned  in  our  public  tribunals.  So  far  from  having  guilt 
and  depravity  stamped  with  want  upon  him,  the  prevailing 
character  of  his  countenance-  was  indication  of  gentleness  and 
humanity.  This  man  was  convicted  of  manslaughter;  and 
when  he  heard  the  sentence  of  transportation  for  life,  all  color 
fled  from  his  cheek,  his  lips  became  dry  and  ashy,  his  hand 
shook,  and  his  eyes  were  the  more  painful  to  look  at  from  their 
being  incapable  of  tears.  Most  of  you  consider  transportation 
a  light  evil,  and  so  it  is,  to  those  who  have  no  ties  to  fasten 
them  to  their  country.  I  can  well  imagine  that  a  deportation 
from  this  island,  which,  for  most  of  its  inhabitants  is  a  misera- 
ble one,  is  to  many  a  change  greatly  for  the  better.  Although 
it  is  to  a  certain  extent,  painful  to  be  torn  from  the  place  with 
which  our  first  recollections  are  associated,  and  the  Irish 
people  have  strong  local  attachments,  and  are  fond  of  the  place 
of  their  birth,  and  of  their  fathers'  graves  —  yet  the  fine  sky, 
the  genial  climate,  and  the  deep  and  abundant  soil  of  New 
Holland,  afford  many  compensations.  But  there  can  be  none 
for  Matthew  Hogan  : — He  is  in  the  prime  of  life,  was  a  pros- 
perous farmer: — he  has  a  young  and  amiable  wife,  who  has 
borne  him  children  ;  but,  alas  ! 

"'  Nor  wife,  nor  children,  more  shall  he  behold, 
Nor  friends,  nor  sacred  home.' 

He  must  leave  his  country  for  ever — he  must  part  from  all 
that  he  loves,  and  from  all  by  whom  he  is  beloved,  and  his 
heart  will  burst  in  the  separation.  On  Monday  next  he  will 
see  his  family  for  the  last  time.  What  a  victim  do  you  behold, 
in  that  unfortunate  man,  of  the  spirit  of  turbulence  which  rages 
among  you  !  Matthew  Hogan  will  feel  his  misfortune  with 
more  deep  intensity,  because  he  is  naturally  a  sensitive  and 
susceptible  man.  He  was  proved  to  have  saved  the  life  of  one 
of  his  antagonists  in  the  very  hottest  fury  of  the  combat,  from 
motives  of  generous  commiseration.  One  of  his  own  kindred, 
in  speaking  to  me  of  his  fate,  said,  'he  would  feel  it  the  more, 
because'  (to  use  the  poor  man's  vernacular  pronunciation)  'he 
was  so  tinder'  This  unhappy  sensibility  will  produce  a  more 
painful  laceration  of  the  heart  than  others  would  experience. 


Mr.  sheil's  speech.  153 

when  Le  bids  his  infants  and  their  mother  farewell  for  ever. 
The  prison  of  this  town  will  present  on  Monday  next  a  very 
afflicting  spectacle.  Before  he  ascends  the  vehicle  which  is  to 
convey  him  for  transportation,  to  Cork,  he  will  be  allowed  to 
take  leave  of  his  family.  His  wife  will  cling  with  a  breaking 
heart  to  his  bosom;  and  while  her  arms  are  folded  round  his 
neck,  while  she  sobs  in  the  agony  of  a  virtuous  anguish  on  his 
breast,  his  children,  who  used  to  climb  his  knees  in  playful  emu- 
lation for  his  caresses,  his  little  orphans,  for  they  are  doomed 

to  orphanage  in  their  father's  lifetime I  will  not  go  on 

with  this  distressing  picture:  your  own  emotions  (for  there  are 
many  fathers  and  husbands  here)  will  complete  it.  But  the 
sufferings  of  poor  Hogan  will  not  end  at  the  threshold  of  his 
prison : — He  will  be  conveyed  in  a  vessel,  freighted  with 
affliction,  across  the  ocean,  and  will  be  set  on  the  lonely  and 
distant  land,  from  which  he  will  return  no  more.  Others,  who 
will  have  accompanied  him,  will  soon  forget  their  country,  and 
devote  themselves  to  those  useful  and  active  pursuits  for  which 
the  colony  affords  a  field,  and  which  will  render  them  happier, 
by  making  them  better  men.  But  the  thoughts  of  home  will 
still  press  upon  the  mind  of  Matthew  Hogan,  and  adhere  with 
a  deadly  tenacity  to  his  heart.  He  will  mope  about,  in  the 
vacant  heedlessness  of  deep  and  settled  sorrow;  he  will  have 
no  incentive  to  exertion,  for  he  will  have  bidden  farewell  to 
hope.  The  instruments  of  labor  will  hang  idly  in  his  hands; 
he  will  go  through  his  task  without  a  consciousness  of  what  he 
is  doing:  or  if  he  thinks  at  all  while  he  turns  up  the  earth, 
he  will  think  of  the  little  garden  beside  his  native  cottage, 
which  it  was  more  a  delight  than  a  toil  to  till.  Thus  his 
day  will  go  by,  and  at  its  close  his  only  consolation  will  be 
to  stand  on  the  seashore,  and  fixing  his  eyes  in  that  direction 
in  which  he  will  have  been  taught  that  his  country  lies  —  if 
not  in  the  language,  he  will  at  least  exclaim  in  the  sentiments 
which  have  been  so  simply  and  so  pathetically  expressed  in 
the  Song  of  Exile  : — 

*"  Erin,  ir.y  country  !  though  sad  and  forsaken, 
In  dreams  I  revisit  thy  sea-beaten  shore ; 
But,  alas!  in  a  far  foreign  land  I  awaken, 

And  sigh  for  the  friends  that  can  meet  me  no  more.'*' 


CONFESSIONS  OF  A  JUNIOR  BARRISTER.* 

My  father  was  agent  to  an  extensive  absentee  property  in 
the  south  of  Ireland.  He  was  a  Protestant,  and  respectably 
connected.  It  was  even  understood  in  the  country  that  a  kind 
of  Irish  relationship  existed  between  him  and  the  distant  pro- 
prietor whose  rents  he  collected.  Of  this,  however,  I  have 
some  doubts;  for,  generally  speaking,  our  aristocracy  are 
extremely  averse  to  trusting  their  money  in  the  hands  of  a 
poor  relation.  Besides  this,  I  was  more  than  once  invited  to 
dine  with  a  leading  member  of  the  family  when  I  was  at  the 
Temple,  which  would  hardly  have  been  the  case,  had  he  sus- 
pected on  my  part  any  dormant  claim  of  kindred.  Being  an 
eldest  son,  I  was  destined  from  my  birth  for  the  Bar.  This, 
about  thirty  years  ago,  was  almost  a  matter  of  course  with  our 
secondary  gentry.  Among  such  persons  it  was,  at  that  time, 
an  object  of  great  ambition  to  have  "  a  young  counsellor"  in 
the  family.  In  itself  it  was  a  respectable  thing  —  for,  who. 
could  tell  what  the  "young  counsellor"  might  not  one  day  be] 
Then  it  kept  off  vexatious  claims,  and   produced  a  general 

*  This  amusing  sketch,  of  which  it  may  be  said,  "  Se  non  e  vero,  e  ben  tro- 
valo"  was  prefaced  with  the  following  notice: — "  Mr.  Editor:  The  author 
of  the  Irish  Bar  Sketches  seems  of  late  to  have  suspended  his  labors :  and 
should  he  resume  them,  I  question  whether  it  forms  any  part  of  his  plan  to  take 
up  the  subject  upon  which  I  now  propose  to  trouble  the  public.  I  trust,  there- 
fore, that  he  will  not  consider  it  an  act  of  undue  interference  with  bis  exclusive 
rigLu,  if.  pending  his  present  silence,  I  solicit  the  attention  of  your  readers  to 
the  following  sketch  of  myself.  It  may  be  vanity  on  my  part,  but  it  does  strike 
my  humble  judgment  that  the  details  I  am  about  to  submit,  and  I  shall  be  can- 
did even  against  myself,  have  an  interest  of  their  own,  which  will  excuse  their 
publication." — The  suspension  spoken  of  here  was  imaginary,  as  one  of  the 
Sketches  had  appeared  in  May,  i.nd  this  was  published  in  July,  1825. —  M. 


THE  DREAMS  OF  YOUTH.  155 

interested  civility  in  the  neighborhood,  under  the  expectation 
that,  whenever  any  little  point  of  law  might  arise,  the  young 
counsellor's  opinion  might  be  had  for  nothing.  Times  have 
somewhat  changed  in  this  respect.  Yet,  to  this  day,  the  young 
counsellor  who  passes  the  law-vacations  among  his  country 
friends  finds  (at  least  I  have  found  it  so)  that  the  old  feeling 
of  reverence  for  the  name  is  not  yet  extinct,  and  that  his  dicta 
upon  the  law  of  trespass  and  distress  for  rent  are  generally 
deferred  to  in  his  own  county,  unless  when  it  happens  to  be 
the  assizes'-time. 

I  passed  through  my  school  and  college  studies  with  great 
eclat.  At  the  latter  place,  particularly  toward  the  close  of  the 
course,  I  dedicated  myself  to  all  sorts  of  composition.  I  was 
also  a  constant  speaker  in  the  Historical  Society,  where  I  dis- 
covered, with  no  slight  satisfaction,  that  popular  eloquence 
was  decidedly  my  forte.  In  the  cultivation  of  this  noble  art, 
I  adhered  to  no  settled  plan.  Sometimes,  in  imitation  of  the 
ancients,  I  composed  my  address  with  great  care,  and  deliv- 
ered it  from  memory  :  at  others,  I  trusted  for  words  (for  I  am 
naturally  fluent)  to  the  occasion;  but,  whether  my  speech  was 
extemporaneous  or  prepared,  I  always  spoke  on  the  side  of 
freedom.  At  this  period,  and  for  the  two  or  three  years  that 
followed,  my  mind  was  filled  with  almost  inconceivable  enthu- 
siasm for  my  future  profession.  I  was  about  to  enter  it  (I  can 
call  my  own  conscience  to  witness)  from  no  sordid  motives 
As  to  money  matters,  I  was  independent;  for  my  father,  who 
was  now  no  more,  had  left  me  a  profit-rent  of  three  hundred 
pounds  a-year. 

No;  but  I  had  formed  to  my  youthful  fancy  an  idea  of  the 
honors  and  duties  of  an  advocate's  career,  founded  upon  the 
purest  models  of  ancient  and  modern  times.  I  pictured  to 
myself  the  glorious  occasions  it  would  present  of  redressing 
private  wrongs,  of  exposing  and  confounding  the  artful  machi- 
nations of  injustice;  and  should  the  political  condition  of  my 
country  require  it,  as  in  all  probability  it  would,  of  emulating 
the  illustrious  men  whose  eloquence  and  courage  had  so  often 
shielded  the  intended  victim  against  the  unconstitutional  ag- 
gressions of  the  state.     It  was  with  these  views,  and  not  from 


156  CONFESSIONS    OF    A    JUNIOR   BARRISTER. 

a  love  of  "paltry  gold,"  that  I  was  ambitious  to  assume  the 
robe.  With  the  confidence  of  youth,  and  of  a  temperament 
not  prone  to  despair,  I  felt  an  instinctive  conviction  that  I  was 
not  assuming  a  task  above  my  strength  ;  but,  notwithstanding 
my  reliance  upon  my  natural  powers,  I  was  indefatigable  in 
aiding  them,  by  exercise  and  study,  against  the  occasions  that 
were  to  render  me  famous  in  my  generation.  Deferring  for 
the  present  (I  was  now  at  the  Temple)*  a  regular  course  of 
legal  reading,  I  applied  myself  with  great  ardor  to  the  acquire- 
ment of  general  knowledge.  To  enlarge  my  views,  I  went 
through  the  standard  works  on  the  theory  of  government  and 
legislation.  To  familiarize  my  understanding  with  subtle  dis- 
quisitions, I  plunged  into  metaphysics ;  for,  as  Ben  Jonson 
somewhere  says,  "he  that  can  not  contract  the  sight  of  his 
mind,  as  well  as  dilate  and  disperse  it,  wanteth  a  great  fac- 
ulty;" and,  lest  an  exclusive  adherence  to  such  pursuits  should 
have  the  effect  of  damping  my  popular  sympathies,  I  duly 
relieved  them  by  the  most  celebrated  productions  of  imagina- 
tion in  prose  and  verse.  Oratory  was,  of  course,  not  neglected. 
I  plied  at  Cicero  and  Demosthenes.  I  devoured  every  trea- 
tise on  the  art  of  rhetoric  that  fell  in  my  way.  When  alone 
in  my  lodgings,  I  declaimed  to  myself  so  often  and  so  loudly, 
that  my  landlady  and  her  daughters,  who  sometimes  listened 
through  the  keyhole,  suspected,  as  I  afterward  discovered,  that 
I  had  lost  my  wits ;  but,  as  I  paid  my  bills  regularly  and 
appeared  tolerably  rational  in  other  matters,  they  thought  it 
most  prudent  to  connive  at  my  extravagances.  During  the 
last  winter  of  my  stay  at  the  Temple,  I  took  an  active  part,  as 
Gale  Jones,t  to  his  cost,  sometimes  found,  in  the  debates  of 

*  Irish  barristers  are  compelled  to  "  study"  at  the  Temple,  or  some  other  Inn 
of  Court,  in  London,  besides  eating-  half  their  term  dinners  at  the  Queen's 
Inn,  Dublin.  If  an  Irish  barrister  wish  to  practise  at  the  English  bar,  he  must 
first  pass  two  years  at  a  London  Inn  of  Court,  and  pay  the  heavy  stamp-duties 
and  other  charges  —  though  he  had  already  paid  them  in  Dublin. —  M. 

X  John  Gale  Jones  was  a  notoriety  —  in  his  way.  He  was  born  in  1771,  and 
before  he  had  reached  the  years  of  manhood,  had  declared  himself  enamored 
of  French  republican  principles.  Thence,  until  his  death,  in  1838,  he  was  one 
of  the  boldest,  ablest,  and  most  constant  speakers  at  political  meetings  in  Lon- 
don.    In  1810,  he  had  an'aigned  the  House  of  Commons  at  the  bar  of  public 


GALE   JONES.  157 

the  British  Forum,  which  had  just  heen  opened  for  the  final 
settlement  of  all  disputed  points  in  politics  and  morals. 

Such  were  the  views  and  qualifications  with  which  I  came 
to  the  Irish  Bar.  It  may  appear  somewhat  singular,  but  so  it 
was,  that  previous  to  the  day  of  my  call,  I  was  never  inside 
an  Irish  Court  of  Justice.  When  at  the  Temple,  I  had  occa- 
sionally attended  the  proceedings  at  Westminster  Hall,  where 
a  common  topic  of  remark  among  my  fellow-students  was  the 
vast  superiority  of  our  Bar  in  grace  of  manner  and  classical 
propriety  of  diction.  I  had,  therefore,  no  sooner  received  the 
congratulations  of  my  friends  on  my  admission,  than  I  turned 
into  one  of  the  Courts  to  enjoy  a  first  specimen  of  the  forensic 
oratory  of  which  I  had  heard  so  much.  A  young  barrister  of 
about  twelve  years'  standing  was  on  his  legs,  and  vehemently 
appealing  to  the  court  in  the  following  words  :  "  Your  Lord- 
ships perceive  that  we  stand  here  as  our  grandmother's  admin- 
istratrix de  bonis  non ;  and  really,  my  Lords,  it  does  humbly 
strike  me  that  it  would  be  a  monstrous  thing  to  say  that  a 
party  can  now  come  in,  in  the  very  teeth  of  an  Act  of  Parlia- 
ment, and  actually  turn  us  round  under  color  of  hanging  us  up 
on  the  foot  of  a  contract  made  behind  our  backs."     The  Court 

opinion,  and  the  Commons,  instigated  by  the  Government,  committed  him  to 
Newgate,  where  he  remained  until  the  prorogation  of  Parliament,  when  he  was 
liberated  as  a  matter  of  course  —  neither  branch  of  the  Legislature  having  the 
power  of  awarding  imprisonment  beyond  its  own  Session.  He  was  tried,  at 
Warwick,  for  sedition,  and  acquitted  through  the  efforts  of  his  counsel,  Sir 
Samuel  Romilly.  I  heard  him  speak  in  1830,  when  he  was  sixty  years' old,  and 
even  then,  though  his  health  was  rather  broken,  he  displayed  much  of  the  bold- 
ness, fluency,  and  eloquence,  which  had  distinguished  him  in  his  prime.  At  the 
time  I  heard  him,  and  until  his  death,  his  chief  means  of  subsistence  were  what 
he  obtained  by  speaking  for  payment  in  the  political  and  other  discussions 
which  look  place  at  the  Rotunda  in  Blackfriars  Road,  the  Cicernian  Coffee 
House,  and  other  debating  societies  in  London.  I  remember  that  on  one  occa* 
sion,  when  I  had  ventured  to  present  some  matters  of  fact  and  figures  of  arith- 
metic against  his  beautiful  flowers  of  rhetoric,  Gale  Jones  condescended  to  ad- 
mit tba*  he  had  been  mistaken,  and  to  invite  me  from  the  body  of  the  Rotunda, 
where  I  sat,  as  a  spectator,  to  the  platform  where  he  and  the  other  oratora 
were  placed.  On  my  declining  the  invitation  (thinking  that  the  "  post  of 
honor  is  the  private  station,"  in  such  cases),  he  l'equested  that  I  would  drink 
Lis  health,  and  s<  nt  round  his  own  particular  "pewter  pot,"  out  of  which  he 
begged  that  I  wo  :ld  make  the  friendly  libation  ! — TS/[ 


158  CONFESSIONS   OF    A   JUNIOR   BARRISTER. 

admitted  that  the  force  of  the  observation  was  unanswerable, 
and  granted  his  motion  with  costs.  On  inquiry,  I  found  that 
the  counsel  was  among  the  most  rising  men  of  the  Junior  Bar. 

For  the  first  three  or  four  years,  little  worth  recording 
occurred.  I  continued  my  former  studies,  read,  but  without 
much  care,  a  few  elementary  law-books,  picked  up  a  stray 
scrap  of  technical  learning  in  the  courts  and  the  hall,  and  was 
now  and  then  employed  by  the  young  attorneys  from  my  own 
county  as  conducting  counsel  in  a  motion  of  course.  At  the 
outset  I  was  rather  mortified  at  the  scantiness  of  my  business, 
for  I  had  calculated  upon  starting  into  immediate  notice ;  but 
being  easy  in  my  circumstances,  and  finding  so  many  others 
equally  unemployed,  I  ceased  to  be  impatient.  With  regard 
to  my  fame,  however,  it  was  otherwise.  I  had  brought  a  fair 
stock  of  general  reputation  for  ability  and  acquirement  to  the 
bar;  but,  having  done  nothing  to  increase  it,  I  perceived,  or 
fancied  I  perceived,  that  the  estimation  I  had  been  held  in 
was  rapidly  subsiding.  This  I  could  not  endure;  and  as  no 
widows  or  orphans  seemed  disposed  to  claim  my  protection,  I 
determined  upon  giving  the  public  a  first  proof  of  my  powers 
as  the  advocate  of  a  still  nobler  cause.  An  aggregate  meeting 
of  the  Catholics  of  Ireland  was  announced,  and  I  prepared  a 
speech  to  be  delivered  on  their  behalf.  I  communicated  my 
design  to  no  one,  not  even  to  O'Oonnell,  who  had  often  urged 
me  to  declare  myself;  but,  on  the  appointed  day,  I  attended 
at  the  place  of  meeting,  Clarendon-street  Chapel. 

The  spectacle  was  imposing.  Upon  a  platform  erected 
before  the  altar,  stood  O'Connell  and  his  staff.  The  chair 
which  they  surrounded  had  just  been  taken  by  the  venerable 
Lord  Fingal,  whose  presence  alone  would  have  conferred  dig- 
nity upon  any  assembly.  The  galleries  were  thronged  with 
Catholic  beauties,  looking  so  softly  patriotic,  that  even  Lord 
Liverpool  would  have  forgiven  in  them  the  sin  of  a  divided 
allegiance.  The  floor  of  the  chapel  was  filled  almost  to  suffo- 
cation with  a  miscellaneous  populace,  breathing  from  their 
looks  a  deep  sense  of  rights  withheld,  and  standing  on  tiptoe 
and  with  ears  erect  to  catch  the  sounds  of  comfort  or  hope 
which  their  leaders  had  to  administer.     Finding  it  impracti- 


AN   AGGREGATE   MEETING.  159 

cable  to  force  my  way  toward  the  chair,  I  was  obliged  to 
ascend  and  occupy  a  place  in  the  gallery.  I  must  confess 
that  I  was  not  sorry  for  the  disappointment;  for,  in  the  first 
feeling  of  awe  which  the  scene  inspired,  I  found  that  my 
oratorical  courage,  which,  like  natural  courage,  "  comes  and 
goes,"  was  rapidly  "oozing  out;"  —  but,  as  the  business  and 
the  passions  of  the  day  proceeded  —  as  the  fire  of  national 
emotion  lighted  every  eye,  and  exploded  in  simultaneous 
volleys  of  applause — all  my  apprehensions  for  myself  were 
forgotten.  Every  fresh  round  of  huzzas  that  rent  the  roof 
rekindled  my  ambition.  I  became  impatient  to  be  fanned,  for 
my  own  sake,  by  the  beautiful  white  handkerchiefs  that  waved 
around  me,  and  stirred  my  blood  like  the  visionary  flags  of 
the  fabled  Houris  inviting  the  Mohammedan  warrior  to  danger 
and  to  glory. 

O'Connell,  who  was  speaking,  spied  me  in  the  gallery.  He 
perceived  at  once  that  I  had  a  weight  of  oratory  pressing  upon 
my  mind,  and  good-naturedly  resolved  to  quicken  the  delivery. 
Without  naming  me,  he  made  an  appeal  to  me  under  the  char- 
acter of  "  a  liberal  and  enlightened  young  Protestant,"  which 
I  well  understood.  This  was  conclusive,  and  he  had  no  sooner 
sat  down  than  I  was  on  my  legs.  The  sensation  my  unex- 
pected appearance  created  was  immense.  I  had  scarcely  said 
"My  Lord,  I  rise,"  when  I  was  stopped  short  by  cheers  that 
lasted  for  some  minutes.  It  was  really  delicious  music,  and 
was  repeated  at  the  close  of  almost  every  sentence  of  my 
speech.  I  shall  not  dwell  upon  the  speech  itself,  as  most  of 
my  readers  must  remember  it,  for  it  appeared  the  next  day  in 
the  Dublin  Journals  (the  best  report  was  in  the  Freeman), 
and  was  copied  into  all  the  London  opposition  papers  except 
the  Times.  It  is  enough  to  say  that  the  effect  was,  on  the 
whole,  tremendous. 

As  soon  as  I  had  concluded,  a  special  messenger  was  de- 
spatched to  conduct  me  to  the  platform.  On  my  arrival  there, 
I  was  covered  with  praises  and  congratulations.  O'Connell 
was  the  warmest  in  the  expression  of  his  admiration :  yet  I 
thought  I  could  read  in  his  eyes  that  there  predominated  over 
that  feeling  the  secret  triumph  of  the  partisan,  at  having  con- 


160 


CONFESSIONS    OF    A   JUNIOR    BARRISTER. 


tributed  to  bring  over  a  young  deserter  from  the  enemy's 
camp.  However,  lie  took  care  that  I  should  not  go  without 
my  reward.  He  moved  a  special  resolution  of  thanks  "  to  his 
illustrious  young  friend,"  whom  he  described  as  "  one  of  those 
rare  and  felicitous  combinations  of  human  excellence,  in  which 
the  spirit  of  a  Washington  is  embodied  with  the  genius  of  a 
Grattan."  These  were  his  very  words,  but  my  modesty  was 
in  no  way  pained  at  them,  for  I  believed  every  syllable  to  be 
literally  true. 

I  went  home  in  a  glorious  intoxication  of  spirits.  My  suc- 
cess had  surpassed  my  most  sanguine  expectations.  I  had 
now  established  a  character  for  public  speaking,  which,  inde- 
pendently of  the  general  fame  that  would  ensue,  must  inevi- 
tably lead  to  my  retainer  in  every  important  case  where  the 
passions  were  to  be  moved,  and,  whenever  the  Whigs  should 
come  in,  to  a  seat  in  the  British  Senate. 
******** 

After  a  restless  night  —  in  which  however,  when  I  did  sleep, 
I  contrived  to  dream,  at  one  time  that  I  was  at  the  head  of  my 
profession,  at  another  that  I  was  on  the  opposition-side  of  the 
House  of  Commons  redressing  Irish  grievances  —  I  sallied 
forth  to  the  Courts  to  enjoy  the  impression  which  my  display 
of  the  day  before  must  have  made  there.  On  my  way,  my 
ears  were  regaled  by  the  cries  of  the  news-hawkers,  announ- 
cing that  the  morning  papers  contained  "Young  Counsellor 

's  grand   and   elegant   speech." — "This,"  thought  I,  "  is 

genuine  fame,"  and  I  pushed  on  with  a  quickened  pace  toward 
the  Hall. 

On  my  entrance,  the  first  person  that  caught  my  eye  was 
my  friend  and  fellow-student,  Dick .  We  had  been  inti- 
mate at  College,  and  inseparable  at  the  Temple.  Our  tastes 
and  tempers  had  been  alike,  and  our  political  opinions  the 
same,  except  that  he  sometimes  went  far  beyond  me  in  his 
abstract  enthusiasm  for  the  rights  of  man.  I  was  surprised  — 
for  our  eyes  met  —  that  he  did  not  rush  to  tender  me  his  greet- 
ings. However,  I  went  up  to  him,  and  held  out  my  hand  in 
the  usual  cordial  way.  He  took  it,  but  in  a  very  unusual  way. 
The  friendly  pressure  was  no  longer  there.     His  countenance. 


"RESULTS    OF   AN    ORATION,  161 

which  heretofore  had  glowed  with  warmth  at  my  approach, 
was  still  and  chilling.  He  made  no  allusion  to  my  speech, 
but  looking  round  as  if  fearful  of  being  observed,  and  mutter- 
ing something  about  its  being  "  Equity-day  in  the  Exchequer," 
moved  away.  This  was  a  modification  of  "  genuine  fame"  for 
which  I  was  quite  unprepared.  In  my  present  elevation  of 
spirits,  however,  I  was  rather  perplexed  than  offended  at  the 
occurrence.  I  was  willing  to  suspect  that  my  friend  must 
have  found  himself  suddenly  indisposed,  or  that,  in  spite  of  his 
better  feelings,  an  access  of  involuntary  envy  might  have 
overpowered  him  ;  or  perhaps,  poor  fellow,  some  painful  sub- 
ject of  a  private  nature  might  be  pressing  upon  his  mind,  so 
as  to  cause  this  strange  revolution  in  his  manner.  At  the 
time  I  never  adverted  to  the  rumor  that  there  was  shortly  to 
be  a  vacancy  for  a  commissionership  of  bankrupts,  nor  had  I 
been  aware  that  his  name  as  a  candidate  stood  first  on  the 
Chancellor's  list.  He  was  appointed  to  the  place  a  few  days 
after,  and  the  mystery  of  his  coldness  was  explained. 

Yet,  I  must  do  him  the  justice  to  say  that  he  had  no  sooner 
attained  his  object  than  he  showed  symptoms  of  remorse  for 
having  shaken  me  off.  He  praised  my  speech,  in  a  confiden- 
tial way,  to  a  mutual  friend,  and  I  forgave  him  —  for  one  gets 
tired  of  being  indignant  —  and  to  this  day  we  converse  with 
our  old  familiarity  upon  all  subjects  except  the  abstract  rights 
of  man.  In  the  course  of  the  morning  I  received  many  sim- 
ilar manifestations  of  homage  to  my  genius  from  others  of  my 
Protestant  colleagues.  The  young,  who  up  to  that  time  had 
sought  my  society,  uoav  brushed  by  me  as  if  there  was  infec- 
tion in  my  touch.  The  seniors,  some  of  whom  had  occasion- 
ally condescended  to  take  my  arm  in  the  Hall,  and  treat  me 
io  prosing  details  of  their  adventures  at  the  Temple,  held 
themselves  suddenly  aloof,  and,  if  our  glances  encountered, 
petrified   me   with  looks  of  established  order.     In   whatever 

direction  I  cast,  my  eyes,  I  met  signs  of  anger  or  estrange- 
ment, or,  what  was  still  less  welcome,  of  pure  commiseration. 
Snch  were  the  first  fruits  of  my  "  grand  and  elegant  speech," 

which  had   combined   (O'Connell,  may  Heaven  forgive  you  !) 
"  the  spirit  of  a  Washington  with  the  genius  of   a  G rattan." 


1G2  CONFESSIONS    OF   A    JUNIOR    BARRISTER. 

I  must,  however,  in  fairness  state  that  I  was  not  utterly  "left 
alone  in  my  glory."  The  Catholics  certainly  crowded  round 
me  and  extolled  me  to  the  skies.  One  eulogized  my  simile  of 
the  eagle ;  another  swore  that  the  Corporation  would  never 
recover  from  the  last  hit  I  gave  them  ;  a  third  that  my  fortune 
at  the  Bar  was  made.  I  was  invited  to  all  their  dinner-par- 
ties, and  as  far  as  "  lots"  of  white  soup  and  Spanish  flummery 
went,  had  unquestionably  no  cause  to  complain.  The  attor- 
neys, in  both  public  and  private,  were  loudest  in  their  admira- 
tion of  my  rare  qualifications  for  success  in  my  profession ; 
but,  though  they  took  every  occasion,  for  weeks  and  months 
after,  to  recur  to  the  splendor  of  my  eloquence,  it  still  some- 
how happened  that  not  one  of  them  sent  me  a  guinea. 

I  was  beginning  to  charge  the  whole  body  with  ingratitude, 
when  I  was  agreeably  induced  to  change  my  opinion,  at  least 
for  a  while.  One  of  the  most  rising  among  them  was  an  old 
schoolfellow  of  mine,  named  Shanahan.  He  might  have  been 
of  infinite  service  to  me,  but  he  had  never  employed  me,  even 
in  the  most  trivial  matter.  We  were  still,  however,  on  terms 
of,  to  me  rather  unpleasant  familiarity  ;  for  he  affected  in  his 
language  and  manners  a  certain  waggish  slang,  from  which  my 
classical  sensibilities  revolted.  One  day,  as  I  was  going  my 
usual  rounds  in  the  Hall,  Shanahan,  who  held  a  bundle  of 
briefs  under  his  arm,  came  up  and  drew  me  aside  toward  one 
of  the  recesses.  "Ned,  my  boy,"  said  he,  for  that  was  his 
customary  style  of  addressing  me,  "  I  just  want  to  tell  you  that 
I  have  a  sporting  record  now  at  issue,  and  which  I'm  to  bring 

down  to for  trial  at  the  next  assizes.     It's  an  action 

against  a  magistrate,  and  a  Bible-distributer  into  the  bargain, 
for  the  seduction  of  a  farmer's  daughter.  You  are  to  be  in 
it  —  I  have  taken  care  of  that — and  I  just  want  to  know  if 
you'd  like  to  state  the  case,  for,  if  you  do,  it  can  be  managed." 
My  heart  palpitated  with  gratitude,  but  it  would  have  been 
unprofessional  to  give  it  utterance;  so  I  simply  expressed  my 
xeadiness  to  undertake  the  office.  "  Consider  yourself,  then, 
retained  as  stating  counsel,"  said  he,  but  without  handing  me 
any  fee.  "  All  you  want  is  an  opportunity  of  showing  what 
you  cau  do  with  a  jury,  and  never  was  there  a  finer  one  than 


THE   LAWYER   IN   LOVE.  163 

tliis.  It  was  just  sncli  another  that  first  brought  that  lad  there 
into  notice,"  pointing  to  one  of  the  sergeants  that  rustled  by 
us.  "You  shall  have  your  instructions  in  full  time  to  be  pre- 
pared. Only  hit  the  Bible-boy  in  the  way  I  know  you  can, 
and  your  name  will  be  up  on  the  circuit. " 

The  next  day  Shan  ah  an  called  me  aside  again.  In  the 
interval,  I  had  composed  a  striking  exordium  and  peroration, 
with  several  powerful  passages  of  general  application,  to  be 
interspersed  according  as  the  facts  should  turn  out,  through 
the  body  of  the  statement.  "Ned,"  said  the  attorney  to  me, 
as  soon  as  we  had  reached  a  part  of  the  Hall  where  there 
was  no  risk  of  being  overheard,  "I  now  want  to  consult  you 
upon"  —  here  he  rather  hesitated  — "  in  fact,  upon  a  little  case 
of  my  own."  After  a  short  pause  he  proceeded  :  "You  know 
a  young  lady  from  your  count}7,  Miss  Dickson?"  —  "Harriet 
Dickson  V*  —  "  The  very  one."  —  "  Intimately  well ;  she's  now 
in  town  with  her  cousins  in  Harcourt  street :  I  see  her  almost 
every  day."  — "  She  has  a  very  pretty  property  too,  they 
say,  under  her  father's  Avill  —  a  lease  for  lives  renewable  for 
ever."  —  "  So  I  have  always  understood."  —  "  In  fact,  Ned,"  he 
continued,  looking  somewhat  foolish,  and  in  a  tone  half  slang, 
half  sentiment,  "  I  am  rather  inclined  to  think  —  as  at  present 
advised  —  that  she  has  partly  gained  my  affections.  Come, 
come,  my  boy,  no  laughing;  upon  my  faith  and  soul,  I'm 
serious  —  and  what's  more,  I  have  reason  to  think  that  she'll 
have  no  objection  to  my  telling  her  so  :  but,  with  those  devils 
of  cousins  at  her  elbow,  there's  no  getting  her  into  a  corner 
with  one's  self  for  an  instant;  so,  what  I  want  you  to  do  for 
me,  Ned,  is  this — just  to  throw  your  eye  over  a  wide-line  copy 
of  a  little  notice  to  that  effect  I  have  been  thinking  of  serving 
her  with."     Here  he  extracted  from  a  mass  of  law-documents 

a  paper  endorsed,  "Draft  letter  to  Miss  D ,"  and  folded 

up  and  tied  with  red  tape  like  the  rest.  The  matter  corre- 
sponded with  the  exterior.  I  contrived,  but  not  without  an 
effort,  to  preserve  my  countenance  as  I  perused  this  singular 
production,  in  which  sighs  and  vows  were  embodied  in  the 
language  of  an  affidavit  to  hold  to  bail.  Amid  the  manifold 
vagaries   of  Cupid,   it   was    the    first    time    I    had    seen    him 


164  CONFESSIONS   OF   A   JUNIOR   BAEElSTfiR. 

exchanging  his  ordinary  dart  for  an  Attorney's  office-pen. 
When  I  came  to  the  end,  he  asked  if  I  thought  it  might  be 
improved.  I  candidly  answered  that  it  would,  in  my  opinion, 
admit  of  change  and  correction.  "  Then,"  said  he,  "I  shall  be 
eternally  obliged  if  you'll  just  do  the  needful  with  it.  You 
perceive  that  I  have  not  been  too  explicit,  for,  between  our- 
selves, I  have  one  or  two  points  to  ascertain  about  the  state 
of  the  property  before  I  think  it  prudent  to  commit  myself  on 
paper.  It  would  never  do,  you  know,  to  be  brought  into  court 
for  a  breach  of  promise  of  marriage;  so  you'll  keep  this  in 
view,  and  before  you  begin,  just  cast  a  glance  over  the  Statute 
of  Frauds."  Before  I  could  answer,  he  was  called  away  to 
attend  a  motion. 

The  office  thus  flung  upon  me  was  not  of  the  most  dignified 
kind,  but  the  seduction-case  was  too  valuable  to  be  risked  ;  so 
pitting  my  ambition  against  my  pride,  I  found  the  latter  soon 
give  way  ;  and  on  the  following  day  I  presented  the  lover 
with  a  declaratory  effusion  at  once  so  glowing  and  so  cautious, 
so  impassioned  as  to  matters  of  sentiment,  but  withal  so 
guarded  in  point  of  law,  that  he  did  not  hesitate  to  pronounce 
it  a  masterpiece  of  literary  composition  and  forensic  skill.  He 
overwhelmed  me  with  thanks,  and  went  home  to  copy  and 
despatch  it.  I  now  come  to  the  most  whimsical  part  of  the 
transaction.  With  Miss  Dickson,  as  I  had  stated  to  her  ad- 
mirer, I  was  extremely  intimate.  We  had  known  each  other 
from  childhood,  and  conversed  Avith  the  familiarity  rather  of 
cousins  than  mere  acquaintances.  When  she  was  in  town,  I 
saw  her  almost  daily,  talked  to  her  of  myself  and  my  pros- 
pects, lectured  her  on  her  love  of  dress,  and  in  return  was 
alwaj's  at  her  command  for  any  small  service  of  gallantry  or 
friendship  that  she  might  require.  The  next  time  I  called,  I 
could  perceive  that  I  was  unusually  welcome.  Her  cousins 
were  with  her,  but  they  quickly  retired  and  left  us  together. 
As  soon  as  we  were  alone,  Harriet  announced  to  me  "that 
she  had  a  favor — a  very  great  one  indeed  —  to  ask  of  me." 
She  proceeded,  and  with  infinite  command  of  countenance. 
"There  was  a  friend  of  hers  —  one  for  whom  she  was  deeply 
interested — in  fact  it  was  —  but  no  —  she  must  not  betray  a 


LAW   AND   LOVE.  165 

secret  —  and  this  friend  bad  the  day  before  received  a  letter 
containing  something  like,  but  still  not  exactly  a  proposition 
of — in  short,  of  a  most  interesting  nature;  and  her  friend  was 
terribly  perplexed  how  to  reply  to  it,  for  she  was  very  young 
and  inexperienced,  and  all  that;  and  she  had  tried  two  or 
three  times  and  had  failed  ;  and  then  she  had  consulted  her 
(Harriet),  and  she  (Harriet)  had  also  been  puzzled,  for  the 
letter  in  question  was  in  fact,  as  far  as  it  was  intelligible,  so 
uncommonly  well  written,  both  in  style  and  in  sentiment,  that 
her  friend  was,  of  course,  particularly  anxious  to  send  a  suit- 
able reply — and  this  was  Harriet's  own  feeling,  and  she  had 
therefore  taken  a  copy  of  it  (omitting  names)  for  the  purpose 
of  showing  it  to  me,  and  getting  me  —  I  was  so  qualified,  and 
so  clever  at  my  pen,  and  all  that  sort  of  thing — just  to  under- 
take, if  I  only  would,  to  throw  upon  paper  just  the  kind  of 
sketch  of  the  kind  of  answer  that  ought  to  be  returned." 

The  preface  over,  she  opened  her  reticule  and  handed  me  a 
copy  of  my  own  composition.  I  would  have  declined  the 
task,  but  every  excuse  I  suggested  was  overruled.  The  prin- 
cipal objection  —  my  previous  retainer  on  the  other  side  —  I 
could  not  in  honor  reveal ;  and  I  was  accordingly  installed  in 
the  rather  ludicrous  office  of  conducting  counsel  to  both  par- 
ties in  the  suit.  I  shall  not  weary  the  reader  with  a  technical 
detail  of  the  pleadings,  all  of  which  I  drew.  They  proceeded, 
if  I  remember  right,  as  far  as  a  sur -rebutter — rather  an  unusual 
thing  in  modern  practice.  Each  of  the  parties  throughout  the 
correspondence  was  charmed  with  the  elegance  and  correct- 
ness of  the  other's  style.  Shanahan  frequently  observed  to 
me,  "What  a  singular  thing  it  was  that  Miss  Dickson  was  so 
much  cleverer  at  her  pen  than  her  tongue;"  and  once  upon 
handing  me  a  letter,  of  which  the  eloquence  was  perhaps  a 
little  too  masculine,  he  protested  "  that  he  was  almost  afraid 
to  go  farther  in  the  business,  for  he  suspected  that  a  girl  who 
could  express  herself  so  powerfully  on  paper  would,  one  day 
or  other,  prove  too  much  for  him  when  she  became  his  wife." 
But,  to  conclude,  Shanahan  obtained  the  lady,  and  the  lease 
for  lives  renewable  for  ever.  The  seduction  case  (as  I  after- 
ward   discovered)  had   been   compromised    the  day  before  he 


166  CONCESSIONS    OF   A   JUNIOR   BARRISTER. 

offered  me  the  statement;  and  from  that  day  to  this,  though 
his  business  increased  with  his  marriage,  he  never  sent  me  a 
single  brief.* 

Finding  that  nothing  was  to  be  got  by  making  public 
speeches,  or  writing  love-letters  for  attorneys,  and  having  now 
idled  away  some  valuable  years,  I  began  to  think  of  attending 
sedulously  to  my  profession  ;  and,  with  a  view  to  the  regula- 
tion of  my  exertions,  lost  no  opportunity  of  inquiring  into  the 
nature  of  the  particular  qualifications  by  which  the  men  whom 
I  saw  eminent  or  rising  around  me  had  originally  outstripped 
their  competitors.  In  the  course  of  these  inquiries,  I  discov- 
ered that  there  was  a  newly-invented  method  of  getting  rap- 
idly into  business,  of  which  I  had  never  heard  before.  The 
secret  was  communicated  to  me  by  a  friend,  a  king's  counsel, 
who  is  no  longer  at  the  Irish  Bar.  When  I  asked  him  for  his 
opinion  as  to  the  course  of  study  and  conduct  most  advisable 
to  be  pursued,  and  at  the  same  time  sketched  the  general 
plan  which  had  presented  itself  to  me,  "Has  it  never  struck 
you,"  said  he,  "since  you  have  walked  this  Hall,  that  there  is 
a  shorter  and  a  far  more  certain  road  to  professional  success?" 
I  professed  my  ignorance  of  the  particular  method  to  which  he 
alluded.  "  It  requires,"  he  continued,  "  some  peculiar  qualifi- 
cations :  have  you  an  ear  for  music?"  —  Surprised  at  the  ques- 
tion, I  answered  that  I  had.  "And  a  good  voice?"  —  "A 
tolerable  one."  —  "Then,  my  advice  to  you  is,  to  take  a  few 
lessons  in  psalm-singing  ;  attend  the  Bethesda  regularly  ;  take 
a  part  in  the  anthem,  and  the  louder  the  better;  turn  up  as 
much  of  the  white  of  your  eyes  as  possible  —  and  in  less  than 
six  months  you'll  find  business  pouring  in  upon  you.  You 
smile,  I  see,  at  this  advice;  but  I  have  never  known, the  plan 
to  fail,  except  where  the  party  has  sung  incurably  out  of  tune. 
Don't  you  perceive  that  we  are  once  more  becoming  an  Island 
of  Saints,  and  that  half  the  business  of  these  Courts  passes 
through  their  hands?     When  I  came  to  the  bar,  a  man's  suc- 

*  This  attorney's  non-committal  caution  reminds  me  of  another  of  the  craft, 
who  challenged  a  man  to  fight  a  duel  with  him,  and  fixed  the  meeting-  "  in  the 
Phoenix  Park,  adjacent  unto  the  city  of  Dublin,  and  in  that  part  of  it  entitled 
'The  Fifteen  Acres'  —  be  the  same  more  or  less." — M. 


DRAWING-   WATER   IN    A    SIEVE.  167 

cess  depended  upon  Ins  exertions  during  the  six  working-days 
of  the  week;  but  now,  he  that  lias  the  dexterity  to  turn  the 
Sabbath  to  account  is.  the  surest  to  prosper:  and 

"  '  Why  should  not  piety  he  made, 
As  well  as  equity,  a  trade, 
And  men  get  money  by  devotion 
As  well  as  making-  of  a  motion  V  " 

These  hints,  though  thrown  out  with  an  air  of  jest,  made 
some  impression  on  me ;  but  after  reflecting  for  some  time 
upon  the  subject,  and  taking  an  impartial  view  of  my  powers 
in  that  way,  I  despaired  of  having  hypocrisy  enough  for  the 
speculation,  so  I  gave  it  up.  Nothing  therefore  remaining, 
but  a  more  direct  and  laborious  scheme,  I  now  planned  a 
course  of  study  in  which  I  made  a  solemn  vow  to  myself  to 
persevere.  Besides  attending  the  courts  and  taking  notes  of 
the  proceedings,  I  studied  at  home,  at  an  average  of  eight 
hours  a-dajT.  I  never  looked  into  any  but  a  law-book.  Even 
a  newspaper  I  seldom  took  up.  Every  thing  that  could  touch 
my  feelings  or  my  imagination  I  excluded  from  my  thoughts, 
as  inimical  to  the  habits  of  mind  I  now  was  anxious  to  acquire. 
My  circle  of  private  acquaintances  was  extensive,  but  I  man- 
fully resisted  every  invitation  to  their  houses.  I  had  assigned 
myself  a  daily  task  to  perform,  and  to  perform  it  I  was  deter- 
mined. I  persevered  for  two  years  with  exemplary  courage. 
Neither  the  constant,  unvarying,  unrewarded  labors  of  the 
day,  nor  the  cheerless  solitude  of  the  evenings,  could  induce 
me  to  relax  my  efforts. 

I  was  not,  however,  insensible  to  the  disheartening  change, 
both  physical  and  moral,  that  was  going  on  within  me.  All 
the  generous  emotions  of  my  youth,  my  sympathies  with  the 
rights  and  interests  of  the  human  race,  my  taste  for  letters, 
even  my  social  sensibilities,  were  perceptibly  wasting  away 
from  Avant  of  exercise,  and  from  the  hostile  influence  of  an 
exclusive  and  chilling  occupation.  It  fared  still  worse  with 
my  health  :  I  lost  my  appetite  and  rest,  and  of  course  my 
strength  ;  a  deadly  pallor  overcast  my  features  ;  black  circles 
formed  round  my  eyes;  my  cheeks  sank  in;  the  tones  of  my 
voice  became  feeble  and  melancholy  ;   the  slightest  exercise 


168  CONFESSIONS   OF    A   JUNIOR   BARRISTER. 

exhausted  me  almost  to  fainting;  at  night  I  was  tortured  by 
headaches,  palpitations,  and  frightful  dreams ;  my  waking 
reflections  were  equally  harassing.  I  now  deplored  the  sinis- 
rer  ambition  that  had  propelled  me  into  a  scene  for  which,  in 
spite  of  all  my  self-love,  I  began  to  suspect  that  I  Avas  utterly 
unfitted.  I  recalled  the  bright  prospects  under  which  I  had 
entered  life,  and  passed  in  review  the  various  modes  in  which 
I  might  have  turned  my  resources  to  honorable  and  profit- 
able account.  The  contrast  was  fraught  with  anguish  and 
mortification. 

As  I  daily  returned  from  the  Courts,  scarcely  able  to  drag 
my  wearied  limbs  along,  but  still  attempting  to  look  as  alert 
and  cheerful  as  if  my  success  was  certain,  I  frequently  came 
across  some  of  my  college  contemporaries.  Such  meetings 
always  gave  me  pain,  Some  of  them  were  rising  in  the  army, 
others  in  the  church  ;  others,  by  a  well-timed  exercise  of  their 
talents,  were  acquiring  a  fair  portion  of  pecuniary  competence 
and  literary  fame.  They  all  seemed  happy  and  thriving,  con- 
tented with  themselves  and  with  all  around  them ;  while  here 
was  I,  wearing  myself  down  to  a  phantom  in  a  dreary  and 
profitless  pursuit,  the  best  years  of  my  youth  already  gone, 
absolutely  gone  for  nothing,  and  the  prospect  overshadowed 
by  a  deeper  gloom  with  every  step  that  I  advanced.  The 
friends  whom  I  thus  met  inquired  with  good-nature  after  my 
concerns;  but  I  had  no  longer  the  heart  to  talk  of  myself.  I 
broke  abruptly  from  them,  and  hurried  home  to  picture  to  my 
now  morbid  imagination  the  forlorn  condition  of  the  evening 
of  life  to  a  briefless  barrister.  How  often,  at  this  period,  I 
regretted  that  I  had  not  chosen  the  English  Bar,  as  I  had 
more  than  once  been  advised.  There,  if  I  had  not  prospered, 
my  want  of  success  would  have  been  comparatively  unob- 
served. In  London  I  should,  at  the  worst,  have  enjoyed  the 
immunities  of  obscurity  ;  but  here  my  failure  would  be  exposed 
to  the  most  humiliating  publicity.  Here  I  was  to  be  doomed, 
day  after  day  and  year  after  year,  to  exhibit  myself  in  places 
of  public  resort,  and  advertise,  in  my  own  person,  the  disap- 
pointment of  all  my  hopes. 

These    gloomy    reflections    were    occasionally   relieved    by 


tiOPELESS-NESS.  169 

others  of  a  more  soothing  and  philosophic  cast.  The  catas- 
trophe, at  the  prospect  of  which  I  shuddered,  it  was  still  in 
my  own  power  to  avert.  The  sufferings  that  I  endured  were, 
after  all,  the  factitious  growth  of  an  unwise  ambition.  I  was 
still  young  and  independent,  and  might,  by  one  manly  effort, 
sever  myself  for  ever  from  the  spell  that  bound  me;  I  might 
transport  myself  to  some  distant  scene,  and  find  in  tranquillity 
and  letters  an  asylum  from  the  feverish  cares  that  now  bore  me 
down.  The  thought  was  full  of  comfort,  and  I  loved  to  return 
to  it.  I  reviewed  the  different  countries  in  which  such  a  rest- 
ing-place might  best  be  found,  and  was  not  long  in  making  a 
selection.  Switzerland,  with  her  lakes  and  hills,  and  moral 
and  poetic  associations,  rose  before  me :  there  inhabiting  a 
delightful  cottage  on  the  margin  of  one  of  her  lakes,  and 
emancipated  from  the  conventional  inquietudes  that  now 
oppressed  me,  I  should  find  my  health  and  my  healthy 
sympathies  revive. 

In  my  present  frame  of  mind,  the  charms  of  such  a  philo- 
sophic retreat  were  irresistible.  I  determined  to  bid  an  eter- 
nal adieu  to  demurrers  and  special  contracts,  and  had  already 
fixed  upon  the  time  for  executing  my  project,  when  an  unex- 
pected obstacle  interposed.  My  sole  means  of  support  was 
the  profit-rent,  of  which  I  have  already  spoken.  The  land, 
out  of  which  it  arose,  lay  in  one  of  the  insurrectionary  dis- 
tricts;  and  a  letter  from  my  agent  in  the  country  announced 
that  not  a  shilling  of  it  could  be  collected.  In  the  state  of 
nervous  exhaustion  to  which  the  "blue  books"  and  the  blue 
devils  had  reduced  me,  I  had  no  strength  to  meet  this  unex- 
pected blow.  To  the  pangs  of  disappointed  ambition  were 
now  added  the  horrors  of  sudden  and  hopeless  poverty.  I 
sank  almost  without  a  struggle,  and  becoming  seriously  indis- 
posed, was  confined  to  my  bed  for  a  week,  and  for  more  than 
a  month  to  the  house. 

When  I  was  able  to  crawl  out,  I  moved  mechanically  toward 
the  Courts.  On  entering  the  Hall,  I  met  my  friend,  the  king's 
counsel,  who  had  formerly  advised  the  Bethesda  :  he  was 
struck  by  my  altered  appearance,  inquired  with  much  concern 
into  the  particulars  of  my  recent  illness,  of  which  he  had  not 

Vol.  II.— 8 


170  CONFESSIONS    OF   A   JUNIOR   BARRISTER. 

heard  before,  and,  urging  the  importance  of  change  of  air, 
insisted  that  I  should  accompany  him  to  pass  a  short  vacation 
then  at  hand  at  his  country-house  in  the  vicinity  of  Dublin. 
The  day  after  my  arrival  there,  I  received  a  second  letter 
from  my  agent,  containing  a  remittance,  and  holding  out  more 
encouraging  prospects  for  the  future.  After  this  I  recovered 
wonderfully,  both  in  health  and  in  spirits.  My  mind,  so  agi- 
tated of  late,  was  now,  all  at  once,  in  a  state  of  the  most  per- 
fect tranquillity  :  from  which  I  learned,  for  the  first  time,  that 
there  is  nothing  like  the  excitement  of  a  good  practical  blow 
(provided  you  recover  from  it)  for  putting  to  flight  a  host  of 
imaginary  cares.  I  could  moralize  at  some  length  on  this 
subject,  but  I  must  hasten  to  a  conclusion. 

The  clay  before  our  return  to  town,  my  friend  had  a  party 
of  Dublin  acquaintances  at  his  house  :   among  the  guests  was 

the  late  Mr.  D ,  an  old  attorney  in  considerable  business, 

and  his  daughter.  Iii  the  evening,  though  it  was  summer- 
time, Ave  had  a  dance.     I  led  out  Miss  D :    I  did   so,  I 

seriously  declare,  without  the  slightest  view  to  the  important 
consequences  that  ensued.  After  the  dance,  which  (I  remem- 
ber it  well)  was  to  the  favorite  and  far-famed  "  Leg-of-Mutton 
jig,"  I  took  my  partner  aside,  in  the  usual  way,  to  entertain 
her.  I  began  \)y  asking  if  "she  was  not  fond  of  poetry1?" 
She  demanded  "why  I  asked  the  question?"  I  said,  "Be- 
cause I  thought  I  could  perceive  it  in  the  expression  of  her 
eyes."  She  blushed,  "  protested  I  must  be  flattering  her,  but 
admitted  that  she  was."  I  then  asked  "if  she  did  not  think 
the  Corsair  a  charming  poem  ?"  She  answered,  "  Oh,  yes  !"  — 
"  And  would  not  she  like  to  be  living  in  one  of  the  Grecian 
islands'?"  —  "Oh,  indeed  she  would."  — "  Looking  upon  the 
blue  waters  of  the  Archipelago  and  the  setting  sun,  associated 
as  they  were  with  the  rest."  —  "How  delightful  it  would  be  !" 
exclaimed  she.  "And  so  refreshing!''  said  I.  I  thus  con- 
tinued till  we  were  summoned  to  another  set.  She  separated 
from  me  with  reluctance,  for  I  could  see  that  she  considered 
my  conversation  to  be  the  sublimest  thing  that  could  be. 

The  effect  of  the  impression  *I  had  made  soon  appeared. 
Two  days  after,  I  received  a  brief  in  rather  an  important  case 


REALITY    V.    ROMANCE.  171 

from  lier  father's  office.  I  acquitted  myself  so  much  to  Lis 
satisfaction,  that  lie  sent  me  another,  and  another,  and  finally 
installed  me  as  one  of  his  standing  counsel  for  the  junior  busi- 
ness of  his  office.  The  opportunities  thus  afforded  me  brought 
me  by  degrees  into  notice.  In  the  course  of  time,  general 
business  began  to  drop  in  upon  me,  and  has  latterly  been 
increasing  into  such  a  steady  stream,  that  I  am  now  inclined 
to  look  upon  my  final  success  as  secure. 

I  have  only  to  add,  that  the  twelve  years  I  have  passed  at 
the  Irish  Bar  have  worked  a  remarkable  change  in  some  of 
my  early  tastes  and  opinions.  I  no  longer,  for  instance, 
trouble  my  head  about  immortal  fame;  and,  such  is  the  force 
of  habit,  have  brought  myself  to  look  upon  a  neatly -folded 
brief,  with  a  few  crisp  Bank-of- Ireland  notes  on  the  back  of  it, 
as,  beyond  all  controversy,  the  most  picturesque  object  upon 
which  the  human  eye  can  alight. 


LORD   MANNERS. 

On  the  31st  day  of  July,  in  the  year  of  our  Lord  1827,  Lord 
Manners,  the  late  Keeper  of  his  Majesty's  Irish  Conscience, 
bade  the  Irish  bar  farewell.*  The  scene  which  took  place 
upon  that  melancholy  occasion  deserves  to  be  recorded.  It 
being  understood  that  an  address  of  professional  condolence 
on  behalf  of  the  more  loyal  portion  of  the  bar  was  to  be  pro- 
nounced by  that  tender  enunciator  of  pathetic  sentiment,  the 
Attorney-General,  the  Court  of  Chancery  was  crowded  at  an 
early  hour.  The  members  of  the  Beef-Steak  Club,  with  coun- 
tenances in  which  it  was  difficult  to  determine  whether  their 
grief  at  the  anticipated  "  export"  from  Ireland,  or  the  traces 

*  Lord  Manners,  was  son  of  Lord  George  Manners,  of  the  Ducal  house  of 
Rutland.  He  was  born  in  1756,  was  educated  at  Cambridge,  where  he  obtained 
the  honor  of  being  fifth  wrangler,  and,  having  been  called  to  the  bar,  in  due 
time  became  Solicitor-General  to  the  Prince  of  Wales,  and  one  of  his  parlia- 
mentary adherents.  In  1802,  when  made  Solicitor-General  to  the  king,  he  was 
knighted.  In  1803  he  was  one  of  the  official  prosecutors  of  Colonel  Despard, 
tried  and  executed  for  high  treason.  He  was  made  one  of  the  Barons  of  the 
Exchequer  in  1805,  and  in  1807  was  raised  to  the  peerage,  on  being  appointed 
Lord-Chancellor  of  Ireland,  as  successor  to  Mr.  Ponsonby.  On  demanding  the 
Seals,  with  all  wonted  formality,  he  discovered  that  he  had  accidentally  left 
behind  him  the  authority  for  assuming  the  new  dignity !  Lord  Manners  held 
the  Irish  Chancellorship  for  twenty  years  —  until  July,  1827,  when  he  was  re- 
called, and  succeeded  by  Sir  Anthony  Hart.  As  an  equity  judge,  he  wanted 
capacity,  and  was  further  deficient,  by  being  a  decided  political  partisan.  Many 
of  his  judgments  were  reversed  by  the  House  of  Lords,  and  nothing  but  the 
fact  that  he  was  ultra-Protestant  in  his  principles  could  have  retained  him,  so 
long,  in  a  position  where  the  general  opinion  of  the  profession  as  to  his  con- 
duct and  qualifications  was  contemptuous  in  the  extreme.  He  died  in  May, 
1842,  iged  eighty-six. —  M. 


HIS    FRIENDSHIP    FOR   MR.    SAURIN".  173 

of  tlieir  multitudinous  convivialities,  enjoyed  a  predominance, 
filled  the  galleries  on  either  side.  The  junior  aristocracy  of 
the  bar,  for  whom  the  circuits  have  few  attractions,  occupied 
the  body  of  the  court;  while  the  multitude  of  King's  counsel, 
in  whom  his  Majesty  scarcely  finds  a  verification  of  the  divine 
saying  of  Solomon,  were  arrayed  along  the  benches,  where  it 
is  their  prerogative  to  sit,  in  the  enjoyment  of  that  leisure 
which  the  public  so  unfrequently  disturb.  The  assembly 
lookec]  exceedingly  dejected  and  blank.  A  competition  in 
sorrow  appeared  to  have  been  got  up  between  the  rival  admi- 
rers of  his  Lordship,  the  Pharisees  of  Leeson  and  the  Saddu- 
cees  of  the  Beef-Steak  Club.  "  The  Saints,"  however,  from 
their  habitual  longitude  of  visage,  and  the  natural  alliance  be- 
tween their  lugubrious  devotion  and  despair,  had  a  decided 
advantage  over  the  statesmen  of  revelry  and  the  legislators 
of  song;  and  it  was  admitted  on  all  hands  that  Mr.  M'Kaskey 
should  yield  the  palm  of  condolence  to  a  certain  pious  Ser- 
geant, into  whom  the  whole  spirit  of  the  prophet  Jeremy  ap- 
peared to  have  been  infused. 

But  the  person  most  deserving  of  attention  was  Mr.  Saurin. 
Lord  Manners  had  been  his  intimate  associate  for  twenty  years. 
He  had,  upon  his  Lordship's  first  arrival  in  Ireland,  pre-occu- 
pied  his  mind  ;  he  took  advantage  of  his  opportunities  of  access, 
and,  having  crept  like  an  earwig  into  his  audience,  he  at  last 
effected  a  complete  lodgment  in  his  mind.  Mr.  Saurin  estab 
lished  a  masterdom  over  his  faculties,  and  gave  to  ail  his  pas 
sions  the  direction  of  his  own.  A  very  close  intimacy  grew 
up  between  them,  which  years  of  intercourse  cemented  into 
regard.  They  were  seen  every  day  walking  together  to  the 
court,  with  that  easy  lounge  which  indicated  the  carelessness 
and  equality  of  their  friendship.  In  one  instance  only  had 
Lord  Manners  been  wTanting  in  fidelity  to  his  companion.  He 
had  been  commissioned  to  inform  him  (at  least  he  was  himself 
six  months  before  apprized  of  the  intended  movement)  that 
Mr.  Plunket  would,  in  return  for  his  services  to  the  Adminis- 
tration, be  raised  to  the  office  of  Attorney-General  for  Ireland. 
Had  Mr.  Saurin  been  informed  of  this  determination,  he  might 
have  acted  more  wisely  than  he  did,  when,  in  a  lit  of  what  his 


174:  LORD    MANNERS. 

advocates  have  been  pleased  to  call  magnanimity,  but  which 
was  nothing  else  than  a  paroxysm  of  offended  arrogance,  he 
declined  the  Chief-Justiceship  of  the  King's  Bench  !  Lord 
Wellesley  took  him  at  his  word,  and  gave  him  no  opportunity 
to  retrace  his  steps.  He  would  not,  at  all  events,  have  been 
taken  unawares.  Mr.  Saurin  is  not  conspicuous  for  his  tenden- 
cies to  forgiveness,  but  he  pardoned  the  person  in  whose  favor, 
of  all  others,  a  barrister  should  make  an  exception  from  his 
vindictive  habits.  Their  intercourse  was  renewed  ;  and  what- 
ever might  have  been  the  state  of  their  hearts,  their  arms  con- 
tinued to  be  linked  together.  This  intimacy  was  noted  by  the 
solicitors,  and,  although  deprived  of  his  official  power,  Mr. 
Saurin  retained  his  business,  and  the  importance  which  at- 
tends it. 

The  resignation,  therefore,  of  Lord  Manners,*  to  whose  court 
his  occupations  were  confined,  was  accounted  a  personal  mis- 
fortune to  himself.  From  the  peculiar  circumstances  in  which 
he  was  placed,  he  drew  the  general  notice  in  the  scene  of  sep- 
aration, and  was  an  object  of  interest  to  those  who,  without 
any  political  sympathy  or  aversion,  are  observers  of  feeling, 
and  students  of  the  human  heart.  In  justice  to  him  it  should 
be  stated  that  his  bearing  did  not  greatly  deviate  from  his  ordi- 
nary demeanor,  and  that  he  still  looked  the  character  which 
he  had  been  for  some  time  playing,  if  not  with  profit,  yet  not 
without  applause,  as  the  stoic  of  Orangeism,  and  the  Oato  of 
"  a  falling  state."  Not  that  he  appeared  altogether  insensible, 
but,  in  his  sympathies,  his  own  calamities  did  not  seem  to  have 
any  very  ostensible  share :   any  expression  of  a  melancholy 

*  He  was  succeeded  by  Sir  Anthony  Hart,  bom  in  1759  at  St  Kitt's,  in  the 
West  Indies.  He  was  once  a  Unitarian  preacher  at  Norwich ;  went  to  the  En- 
glish bar ;  practised  in  equity  for  many  years,  and  with  such  success  that  he 
was  then  made  Master  of  the  Rolls,  succeeded  Sir  John  Leach  as  Vice-Chan- 
cellor of  England,  in  April,  1827,  and  was  then  knighted.  In  Ireland  he  gave 
much  satisfaction,  by  reason  of  the  soundness  and  impartiality  of  his  judgments. 
He  literally  had  no  politics,  and  prided  bimself  on  being  a  lawyer  and  nothing 
else  —  in  strong  contrast  to  his  predecessor,  who  was  a  political  partisan  and 
not  much  of  a  lawyer.  He  retired  from  office,  at  the  close  of  1830,  when  the 
Grey  Ministry  appointed  Plunket  to  sucpeed  him,  and  died  December,  1831, 
aged  seventy-two. —  M. 


MR.    JOY.  175 

kind,  that  was  perceivable  through  his  dark  and  Huguenot 
complexion,  seemed  to  arise  more  immediately  from  the  pains 
of  friendship  than  from  any  sentiment  in  more  direct  connec- 
tion with  himself. 

I  can  not  avoid  thinking,  however,  that  his  mind  must  have 
been  full  of  scorpion  recollections  :  there  was,  at  least,  one  in- 
cident which  -must  have  deeply  stung  him.  Had  the  address 
to  Lord  Manners  been  pronounced  by  Mr.  Plunket,  Mr.  Sauna 
might  have  been  reconciled  to  the  representation  of  the  bar,  in 
the  person  of  a  man  who  had  long  approved  himself  his  supe- 
rior. But  to  see  his  own  proselyte  holding  the  place  to  which 
he  had  acquired  a  sort  of  prescriptive  right,  and  to  witness  in 
Henry  Joy  the  Attorney-General  to  a  Whig  Administration, 
while  he  was  himself  without  distinction  or  office,  was,  I  am 
sure,  a  source  of  corrosive  feelings,  and  must  have  pained  him 
to  the  core. 

It  would,  however,  have  been  a  misfortune  for  the  lovers  of 
ridicule,  if  any  man  except  Mr.  Joy  had  pronounced  the  ad- 
dress which  was  delivered  to  the  departing  Chancellor.  He  is 
a  great  master  of  mockery,  and  looks  a  realization  of  Goethe's 
Mephistophiles.  So  strong  is  his  addiction  to  that  species  of 
satire  which  is  contained  in  exaggerated  praise,  that  he  scarcely 
ever  resorts  to  any  other  species  of  vituperation.  Nature  has 
been  singularly  favorable  to  him.  His  short  and  upturned  nose 
is  admirably  calculated  ^to  toss  his  sarcasms  off;  his  piercing 
and  peering  eyes  gleam  and  flash  in  the  voluptuousness  of 
malice,  and  exhibit  the  keen  delight  with  which  he  revels  in 
ridicule  and  luxuriates  in  derision.  His  chin  is  protruded,  like 
that  of  the  Cynic  listening  to  St.  Paul,  in  Raphael's  Cartoon. 
His  muscles  are  full  of  flexibility,  and  are  capable  of  adapting 
themselves  to  every  modification  of  irony.  They  have  the 
advantage,  too,  of  being  covered  with  a  skin  that  dimples  into 
sneers  with  a  plastic  facility,  and  looks  like  a  manuscript  of 
Juvenal  found  in  the  ashy  libraries  of  Herculaneum.  In  this 
eminent  advocate,  such  an  assemblage  of  physiognomical 
qualifications  for  irony  are  united,  as  I  scarcely  think  the 
countenance  of  any  orator  in  the  ancient  city  of  Sardos  could 
Jiave   presented.      His   face    was    an    admirable    commentary 


176  LORD   MANNERS. 

on  the  enormity  of  the  encomium  which  he  was  deputed  to 
offer. 

The  "Evening  Mail,"*  indeed,  the  official  organ  of  the  Or- 
ange faction  in  Ireland,  gives  a  somewhat  different  account  of 
this  amusing  exhibition.  "  Every  sound,"  says  that  graphic 
journalist,  "  was  hushed,  while  the  Attorney-General,  with  a 
tremulous  voice,  but  with  a  feeling  and  emphasis  which  showed 
that  the  sentiments  expressed  came  directly  from  his  heart," 
and  so  forth.  Then  follows  the  address.  I  forbear  from  set- 
ting forth  the  whole  of  it,  but  select  a  single  sentence  :  "  We," 
said  Mr.  Joy,  "  can  not  but  admire  that  distinguished  ability, 
that  strict  impartiality,  and  that  unremitting  assiduity,  with 
which  you  have  discharged  the  various  duties  of  your  office." 
The  delivery  of  this  sentence  was  a  masterpiece  of  sarcastic 
recitation ;  and,  to  any  person  who  desired  to  become  a  profi- 
cient in  the  art  of  sneering,  of  which  Mr.  Joy  is  so  renowned  a 
professor,  afforded  an  invaluable  model. 

Cicero,  in  his  oratorical  treatise,  has  given  an  analysis  of 
the  manner  in  which  certain  fine  fragments  of  eloquence  have 
been  delivered  ;  and  for  the  benefit  of  the  students  of  irony,  it 
may  not  be  improper  to  enter  with  some  minuteness  into  a 
detail  of  the  varieties  of  excellence  with  which  Mr.  Joy  pro- 
nounced this  flagitious  piece  of  panegyric.  With  this  view,  I 
shall  take  each  limb  of  the  sentence  apart.  — "  We  can  not  but 
admire:" — In  uttering  these  words,  he  gave  his  head  that 
slight  shake,  with  which  he  generally  announces  that  he  is 
about  to  let  loose  some  formidable  sarcasm.     He  paused  at  the 

*  The  Dublin  Evening  Mail,  long-  the  leading  ultra-Tory  and  ultra-Protestant 
newspaper  in  Ireland,  was  commenced  in  the  heat  of  the  agitation  on  the 
Catholic  question,  and  obtained  immediate  notoriety  and  influence,  by  means 
of  the  talent  and  vigor  with  which  it  was  conducted,  and  its  boldness  in  per- 
sonality. Curiously  enough,  the  proprietors  (brothers,  named  Sheehan),  had 
been  Catholics,  and  the  violence  of  their  Protestantism  was  greater  (on  that 
account  ?  — ^for  who  so  violent  as  a  renegade  ?)  than  if  they  had  been  born  to 
it.  During  the  Session  of  Parliament,  Remmy  Sheehan  resided  in  London, 
very  much  in  the  confidence  of  the  leaders  of  the  Tory  party,  and  his  corre- 
spondence in  the  Evening  Mail  often  anticipated  even  the  leading  London  pa- 
pers in  political  information.  The  Mail  still  flourishes  —  but  Remmy  Sheehan 
is  no  more.  It  was  said  that  he  returned  to  the  Catholic  faith,  before  he 
died.— M. 


SARCASM   IN   DISGUISE.  177 

same  time,  as  if  lie  felt  a  qualm  of  conscience  at  what  lie  was 
about  to  speak  and  experienced  a  momentary  commiseration 
for  the  victim  of  his  cruel  commendations.  This  feeling  of 
compassion,  however,  only  lasted  for  an  instant,  and  he  as- 
sumed the  aspect  that  became  the  utterance  of  the  vituperative 
adulation  which  he  had  undertaken  to  inflict.  "  We  can  not 
but  admire  the  distinguished  ability  :" — At  the  word  "ability" 
it  was  easy  to  perceive  that  he  could  with  difficulty  restrain  his 
sense  of  extravagance  from  breaking  into  laughter.  However, 
he  did  succeed  in  keeping  down  the  spirit  of  ridicule  within 
the  just  boundaries  of  derision.  At  the  same  time  he  convey- 
ed to  his  auditors  (the  Chancellor  excepted)  the  whole  train 
of  thought  that  was  passing  in  his  mind  ;  and  by  the  magic 
of  his  countenance  recalled  a  series  of  amusing  recollections. 
It  was  impossible  to  look  at  him  without  remembering  the  ex- 
hibitions which  for  twenty  years  had  made  the  administration 
of  justice  in  the  Irish  Court  of  Chancery  the  subject  of  Lord 
Redesdale's  laughter,  and  of  John  Lord  Eldon's  tears.  He 
spoke  it  with  such  a  force  of  mockery,  that  he  at  once  brought  to 
the  mind  of  the  spectators  that  spirit  of  ignorant  self-sufficiency, 
and  presumptuous  precipitation,  with  which  Lord  Manners  dis- 
charged the  business  of  his  court.  A  hundred  cases  seemed 
to  rise  in  his  face.  Stackpoole  and  Stackpoole  appeared  in 
the  curl  of  his  lip  ;  Blake  and  Foster  quivered  in  the  move- 
ment of  his  nostrils  ;  Brossley  against  the  Corporation  of  Dub- 
lin appeared  in  his  twinkling  eyes;  and  "reversal"  seemed 
to  be  written  in  large  characters  between  his  brows.* 

The  next  sarcasm  which  this  unmerciful  adulator  proceeded 
to  apply,  turned  on  his  lordship's  selection  of  magistrates.     At 

*  All  these  were  important  cases,  which  Lord  Manners  decided  one  way, 
while  the  House  of  Lords,  assisted  by  the  judges  of  England,  on  appeal,  deci- 
ded that  he  was  wholly  and  almost  flagrantly  in  error. —  It  would  have  been  dif- 
ficult, I  suspect,  to  have  found  a  worse  equity  judge  than  Lord  Manners.  Some 
time  after  his  death,  while  I  was  going  over  these  Sketches  with  Mi*.  S'heil,  I 
asked  his  opinion  of  Lord  Manners.  His  reply  was  emphatic  enough: — "  Go 
out  into  the  street  —  pick  up  the  first  man  in  a  decent  coat,  who  is  able  to  give 
correct  replies  to  any  three  or  Unary  questions  you  may  put  to  him  —  put  that 
man  on  the  Lord-Chancellor's  scat,  in  Dublin,  and  he  must  make  abetter  judge 
Vhan  Lord  Manners  was." — M. 


178  LORD    MANNERS. 

the  utterance  of  "  strict  impartiality,"  tlie  smile  of  Mr.  Joy 
gleamed  with  a  still  yellower  lustre  over  his  features,  and 
he  threw  his  countenance  into  so  expressive  a  grimace,  that 
the  whole  loyal,  but  pauper  magistracy  of  Ireland  was  brought 
at  once  to  my  view.  I  beheld  a  long  array  of  insolvent  jus- 
tices with  their  arms  out  at  the  elbows,  who  had  been  honored, 
by  virtue  of  their  Protestantism,  with  his  Majesty's  commission 
of  the  peace.* 

I  did  not  think  it  possible  for  the  powers  of  irony  to  go  be- 
yond this  last  achievement  of  the  Attorney-General,  until  he 
came  to  talk  of  his  lordship's  unremitting  assiduity.  It  was 
well  known  to  every  man  at  the  Bar,  that  Lord  Manners  ab- 
horred his  occupations.  He  trembled  at  an  en  thy  mem,  he 
sunk  under  a  sorites,  and  was  gored  by  the  horns  of  a  dilem- 

*  It  may  be  scarcely  worth  mention  —  but  I  may  as  well  state  that,  when  I 
lived  in  Ireland  (five-and-twenty  years  ago  :  eheu  fugaces  anni  /)  I  had  frequent 
occasion  to  notice  that  the  Catholics  preferred  going  before  a  Protestant  magis- 
trate, even  though  a  justice  of  their  own  persuasion  might  be  nearer  their  vicin- 
ity. When  I  was  a  hoy,  I  passed  much  of  my  time  at  the  house  of  my  uncle, 
the  late  John  Shelton,  of  Rossmore,  in  my  native  county  of  Limerick,  and  I 
noticed  that  the  peasantry  always  brought  their  complaints  before  him  in  prefer- 
ence to  a  Catholic  Justice  of  the  Peace  who  lived  on  the  other  side  of  the 
mountain,  and  nearer  to  their  homes.  Their  complaint  was  that  their  own 
magistrate  "  was  too  severe,  entirely,  upon  them."  So,  a  few  years  after,  when 
I  was  at  school,  at  Fermoy,  in  the  county  of  Cork,  there  was  an  excellent  man, 
and  a  Catholic  (Thomas  Dennehy,  of  Belleview),  who  was  a  magistrate.  He 
lived  near  Carrigaline,  and  between  Glandalane  and  Fermoy,  but  the  peasantry 
and  the  small  farmers  always  passed  him  by,  and  went  before  George  Walker, 
a  Protestant  magistrate.  I  ascertained  the  cause  —  the  Catholic  Justices  who 
were  "  few  and  far  between,"  were  so  much  exposed  to,  and  afraid  of,  censure, 
that  they  usually  inclined  a  trifle  toward  a  Protestant  complainant  or  defendant 
—  for  fear  that  they  should  be  suspected  of  partiality  toward  persons  of  their 
own  creed. —  Perhaps  I  should  apologize  for  thus  bringing  my  own  experiences 
into  this  note  ;  but,  when  I  resided,  as  a  child,  with  my  uncle,  the  magistrate, 
in  the  county  of  Limerick,  I  was  usually  thrust  into  the  library,  on  wet  days, 
being  accused  (very  unjustly,  of  course)  of  being  "  a  troublesome  lad.'  This 
library  consisted  exclusively  of  a  complete  set  of  Walker's  Hibernian  Magazine, 
recording  Irish  history  during  the  time  of  the  Union,  as  well  as  many  years 
preceJ'ng  and  following  it,  and  the  repeated  perusal  of  these  magazines  made 
me  so  familiar  with  Irish  matters  that  I  recollect  nearly  all  they  told  me  —  which 
may  account  for  the  particular  and  distinctive  details  which  I  have  put  into 
these  notes.— Mt 


AS    A   SPOBTSMAtt.  170 

ma.  His  irritability  in  court  was  the  subject  of  universal  com- 
plaint. He  seemed  to  labor  under  an  incapacity  of  fixing  his 
attention  for  any  continuity  of  time  to  any  given  matter  of 
meditation  ;  and  by  his  wriggling  in  his  seat  during  the  ad- 
mirable arguments  of  Mr.  Pennefather,  and  his  averted  eye, 
and  the  puffing  of  his  cheeks,  exhibited  his  strong  distaste  for 
reasoning,  and  the  horror  which  he  entertained  for  all  induc- 
tive thought.  It  was  in  frosty  weather  that  his  excitability 
and  fretfulness  of  temperament  were  particularly  conspicuous. 
He  was  fond  of  shooting,  and  if  he  was  detained  by  a  long 
argument  beyond  the  usual  period  which  he  allowed  to  the 
hearing  of  causes,  about  Christmas,  he  broke  out  into  fits  and 
starts  of  ludicrous  irritation.  Mr.  Plunket  used  to  say  that 
whenever  Lord  Manners  heard  the  name  of  Mr.  Hitchcock  (a 
gentleman  of  the  Irish  Bar  of  considerable  talents)  his  lordship 
used  to  start,  as  if  it  were  "Hish!  Cock!"  that  had  struck 
his  ear.  The  memory  of  the  Attorney-General,  in  compliment- 
ing him  on  his  "  unremitting  assiduity,"  was,  I  am  sure,  car- 
ried back  to  those  scenes  of  judicial  impatience,  in  which, 
when  the  mercury  stood  at  the  freezing  point,  his  lordship's 
intolerance  of  all  argument  was  exemplified.  The  look  with 
which  Mr.  Joy  executed  the  recitation  of  this  portion  of  his 
address,  was,  if  possible,  a  higher  feat.  It  was  the  c7ief-dfceuvre 
of  mockery,  and  masterpiece  of  derision.  His  eyes,  his  brows, 
his  nose  and  chin.  —  But  I  will  not  undertake  to  describe  him 
—  enough  to  say,  that  such  was  the  potency  of  his  sarcasm, 
that  I  was  transported  in  fancy  to  the  Duke  of  Leinster's  de- 
mesne at  Carton,  where  his  lordship  used  to  shoot,  and  I  be- 
held him  amid  those  brambles  of  which  he  was  much  fonder 
than  the  thorny  quicksets  of  the  law,  with  his  chancellor  hat, 
a  green  jacket,  a  scarlet  waistcoat,  silk  breeches,  and  long 
black  gaiters,  which  constituted  his  usual  sporting  attire. 

I  was,  however,  recalled  from  this  excursion  of  the  imagin 
ation,  by  the  farewell  address  of  his  lordship  to  the  Bar.  The 
Attorney-General  had  concluded,  and  Lord  Manners  rose  to  bid 
it  a  long  adieu.  It  did  him  great  credit  that  he  did  not  fol- 
low the  example  of  Lord  Redesdale,  who  wept  and  whimpered 
upon  his   taking  leave  of  Ireland  and  ten  thousand  a  year. 


180  tOED  MAtfttEKg. 

Lord  Manners  Lad  the  materials  of  consolation  in  his  pocket, 
having  received  about  two  hundred  thousand  pounds  of  the 
public  money,  for  "  the  distinguished  ability,  the  strict  impar- 
tiality, and  unremitting  assiduity,"  of  which  Mr.  Joy  had  per- 
formed the  panegyric.  So  far  from  indulging  in  any  lachry- 
matory mood,  his  lordship  proved  himself  a  partisan  to  the 
last,  by  giving  vent  to  his  factious  antipathies  against  the 
Solicitor-General.  He  had  strenuously  resisted  the  nomina- 
tion of  Mr.  Doherty  to  the  office,  for  which  his  talents  as  a 
speaker,  both  in  Parliament  and  at  the  Bar,  had  eminently 
qualified  him.  There  was  not  an  individual  of  the  profession, 
who  did  not  feel  convinced  that  Lord  Manners  was  actuated 
by  an  hostility  arising  from  political  motives,  founded  upon 
Mr.  Doherty's  support  of  Catholic  Emancipation. 

Nearly  the  last  sentence  in  his  address  is  copied  from  the 
Evening  Mail.  "  If,"  said  his  lordship,  "  I  have  disap- 
pointed or  delayed  the  expectations  of  any  gentleman  of  the 
Bar,  I  lament  it.  I  can  assure  you,  gentlemen,  I  have  not 
been  actuated  by  a  personal  motive,  or  hostile  feeling -against 
him,  but  by  a  sense  of  duty  imposed  on  me,  in  the  situation  in 
which  I  am  placed  to  protect  the  fair  claims  of  the  Bar,  by 
resisting,  to  the  utmost  of  my  power,  the  interference  of  par- 
liamentary or  political  interest  in  the  advancements  in  the 
law."  It  is  obvious  that  under  the  veil  of  affected  regret 
which  Lord  Manners  states  himself  to  have  felt  at  having, 
with  a  view  to  the  promotion  of  Sergeant  Lefroy,  opposed  the 
wishes  of  Mr.  Canning  and  the  directions  of  the  Cabinet,  there 
lurks  in  the  intimation  that  his  lordship  had  opposed  the  inter- 
ference of  parliamentary  and  political  interest,  a  reflection 
upon  Mr.  Doherty,  of  Avhich  good  feeling,  as  well  as  a  sense 
of  justice,  should  have  forbidden  the  expression.  This  Par- 
thian arrow  should  not  have  been  discharged  at  such  a  mo- 
ment. It  was  not  a  time  for  the  indulgence  of  acrimonious 
feelings. 

But,  independently  of  the  factious  rancor  which  is  conveyed 
in  this  reference  to  Mr.  Doherty,  it  is  surprising  that  such  a 
want  of  ordinary  discretion  should  have  been  manifested  by 
an   individual   who  was  himself  so  obnoxious  to  the  unkind 


HIS    INCOMPETENCY.  i81 

observation  with  which,  at  parting,  he  wantonly  aspersed  the 
advancement  of  a  member  of  the  bar.  Lord  Manners  bad 
objected  to  Mr.  Doherty  upon  the  ground  of  his  juniority. 
He  was  not,  himself,  of  as,  long  standing  at  the  English  Bar 
when  he  was  created  Solicitor-General.  Mr.  Doherty  was  at 
the  head  of  his  circuit,  where  he  had  evinced  as  high  qualifi- 
cations as  a  speaker  as  any  gentleman  in  the  whole  profession. 
Lprd  Manners  was  unemployed  at  the  bar,  except  when  he  got 
a  brief  from  his  brother-in-law,  a  solicitor  of  Lincoln's  Inn. 
Lord  Manners'  objection  to  the  exercise  of  parliamentary  or 
political  interest  seems  to  be  equally  strange.  What  but  the 
power  of  the  house  of  Rutland  could  ever  have  raised  a  man 
of  his  feeble  understanding  and  slight  acquirements  to  the 
office  of  Lord  Chancellor  of  Ireland,  to  the  discharge  of  Avhose 
duties  he  was  so  utterly  incompetent,  that  his  able  and  eru- 
dite successor  can  scarcely  refrain  from  expressing  astonish- 
ment at  the  spirit  of  blunder  in  which  almost  every  one  of 
Lord  Manners's  orders,  which  came  before  him  for  revision,  is 
conceived  ? 

After  Lord  Manners  had  delivered  his  valedictory  commem- 
oration of  his  own  deserts,  he  proceeded  to  his  house  in  Ste- 
phen's Green,*  for  the  purpose  of  receiving  a  deputation  from 
the  Corporation  of  Dublin,  between  whom  and  his  Lordship 
twenty  years  of  devoted  adherence  to  the  cause  of  loyal  mo- 
nopoly had  established  a  profound  sympathy.     The  Corpora- 

*  Stephen's  Green  is  a  square  in  Dublin,  an  Irish  mile  in  circumference,  if 
you  walk  round  it  by  the  houses:  an  English  mile,  if  you  measure  by  the  cir- 
cumference of  the  area  within  surrounded  by  iron  railings.  I  should  mention 
that  Irish  longitudinal  exceed  English  miles,  in  the  proportion  of  11  of  the 
former,  to  14  of  the  latter. —  Miss  Edgeworth  told  a  story  of  a  traveller  who 
complained  to  a  Paddy,  of  the  narrowness  of  the  roads.  "  True  enough,"  said 
Pat,  "  but  what  you  lose  in  the  breadth,  you  gain  in  the  length."  In  my  time 
the  roads  were  excellent  and  not  deficient  in  width.  The  system  of  Macad. 
amization,  as  it  is  barbarously  called,  was  pi-actised  on  the  Irish  turnpike  roads 
a  hundred  years  before  a  "  canny  Scot"  filched  it,  from  Ireland,  and  made  a  for- 
tune out  of,  and  won  a  title  from,  John  Bull,  by  passing  it  off  as  his  own  dis- 
covery. In  1847,  under  the  Labor  Expenditure  system,  some  of  the  finest 
roads  in  Ireland  were  torn  up,  under  the  idea  of  improving  them,  and,  the  funds 
failing,  before  the  "  improvements"  commenced,  the  poor  roads  were  left  in 
the  luined  condition  to  which  they  had  been  reduced! — M. 


182  LORD   MANNER^ 

tion  of  Dublin,  it  must  be  on  all  bands  admitted,  were  under 
extraordinary  obligations  to  Lord  Manners  :  a  deficiency  in 
their  accounts  to  tbe  amount  of  upward  of  forty  thousand 
pounds  had  been  tbe  subject  of  a  bill  in  Chancery,  at  the  suit 
of  Mr.  Brosfcley,  wbo,  at  the  instance  of  the  Chamber  of  Com- 
merce, had  taken  proceedings  in  order  to  compel  them  to 
disgorge  the  produce  of  their  systematic  extortion  from  the 
citizens  of  Dublin.  To  the  astonishment  of  the  whole  Bar, 
Lord  Manners  refused  all  relief.  I  well  remember  the  indig- 
nation of  Mr.  Plunket,  when  the  Chancellor  pronounced  his 
decree.  He  shook  his  hand  in  mingled  scorn  for  his  intel- 
lect, and  anger  at  the  everlasting  effrontery  of  the  decision. 
The  decree  has  been  since  opprobriously  reversed  in  the 
House  of  Lords. 

But  the  Corporation  were  grateful  for  the  manifestations  of 
his  Lordship's  good-will;  and  accordingly  on  the  day  of  his 
departure,  and  after  he  had  taken  his  farewell  of  the  bar, 
the  Lord-Mayor,  the  sheriffs,  and  Sir  Abraham  Bradley  King, 
together  with  a  train  of  civic  baronets  and  knights,  with  whom 
his  Majesty  has  repaired  the  exhausted  aristocracy  of  Ireland, 
waited  upon  Lord  Manners.  The  following  is  an  extract  from 
their  address,  taken  from  the  faithful  record,  from  which  a 
relation  has  been  already  made  :  "  We  are  not  insensible  that 
by  your  undeviating  loyalty  to  your  Sovereign,  and  attach- 
ment to  the  true  and  genuine  principles  of  an  unrivalled  Con- 
stitution in  Church  and  State,  you  have  been  exposed  to  the 
malignant  attacks  of  base  and  dastardly  demagogues,  upheld 
by  the  vile  vituperations  of  a  licentious  pi  ess." 

The  Evening  Mail  proceeds  to  state,  that  after  the  Town- 
Clerk  had  concluded  (for  it  seems  that  a  Lord-Mayor  does  not 
enjoy  the  advantages  of  Dogberry,  and  that  reading  and 
writing  do  not  come  to  him  by  nature),  his  Lordship  placed  his 
hand  upon  his  heart,  and  read  the  following  answer:  "  After 
a  residence  of  upward  of  twenty  years  in  your  capital,  where 
my  conduct  in  public  and  private  life  must  be  well  known  to 
you,  this  mark  of  approbation  from  the  highly-respectable  and 
loyal  Corporation  of  the  City  of  Dublin  can  not  fail  to  be 
extremely  gratifying  tome:    I  receive  it  with  pleasure,  and 


fits  SELF-DELtfStOff.  183 

«liali  remember  it  with  gratitude.  Tf  I  have  any  claim  to  Le 
distinguished  by  you,  it  must  arise  from  my  having  anxiously 
confined  myself  to  the  judicial  duties  of  my  office,  and  care- 
fully abstained,  as  far  as  was  consistent  with  the  trust  reposed 
in  me,  from  interfering  in  party  or  political  topics.  This  line 
of  conduct  has  justified  me  in  the  consideration  of  your  consti- 
tutional body,  and  may,  in  some  degree,  have  entitled  me  to 
those  expressions  of  kindness  and  good  opinion  which  accom- 
pany your  address,  and  for  which  I  return  you  my  warmest 
acknowledgments.  I  do  assure  you,  my  Lord-Mayor  and  gen- 
tlemen, I  shall  always  feel  a  strong  interest  in  the  prosperity 
of  your  Corporation,  and  a  grateful  sense  of  the  obligations  I 
owe  to  Ireland." 

The  Evening  Mail  mentions  that  the  Chancellor  then 
handed  the  address  to  the  Lord-Mayor;  but  it  omits  to  record 
that  the  worthy  functionary  stood  before  the  Chancellor  in  a 
state  of  cataleptic  astonishment.  The  whole  of  his  attendants, 
from  the  High-Sheriffs  down  to  the  Rev.  Tighe  Gregory,  and 
Mr.  David  M'Cleary,  the  oratorical  tailor,  who  cut  out  Sir 
Abraham  Bradley's  surtout,  participated  in  the  feeling  of  the 
Lord-Mayor,  and  stood  with  their  eyes  fixed  upon  the  Chancel- 
lor, like  the  statues  of  amazement  in  all  its  different  forms* 

The  assurance  given  by  his  Lordship  that  he  had  never 
interfered  in  politics,  struck  them  into  stupefaction.  Lord 
Manners  was  at  a  loss  to  account  for  this  phenomenon,  and 
vainly  endeavored  to  rouse  the  Lord-Mayor  from  the  influ- 
ences of  wonder  to  a  consciousness  of  external  objects.  He 
placed  the  address  in  his  hand,  but  it  dropped  out  of  it.     He 

*  Sir  A.  B.  King,  Dr.  Gregory,  and  Davy  M'Cleary,  were  members  of  the  Corpo- 
ration of  Dublin,  in  those  days,  and  (as  such)  violent  partisans  and  politicians. 
King  was  Stationer  to  the  Crown,  and  the  Grey  Ministry  broke  his  patent, 
thereby  annulling  the  lucrative  appointment.  King,  neai'ly  ruined,  and  half 
heart-broken,  went  to  O'Connell,  against  whom  he  had  been  making  speeches 
for  twenty  years,  and  placed  himself  and  his  case  in  the  hands  of  his  old  oppo- 
nent. O'Connell  devoted  himself  to  the  matter,  obtained  a  pension  of  twelve 
hundred  pounds  sterling,  for  King,  as  compensation,  and  the  Orangeman's 
death-bed  words  were  of  gratitude  to  O'Connell.  M'Cleary  is  also  dead. 
Gregoiy  got  a  rich  living  in  Ireland,  and  expecting  no  more  gain  by  politics,  is 
now  a  rational  man. —  M. 


1S4  LORD   MANNERS. 

adopted  various  other  expedients,  but  in  vain.  At  length,  how- 
ever, he  bethought  himself  of  an  artifice,  which  was  attended 
with  instantaneous  success;  and,  as  the  Evening  Mail  has  it, 
"invited  the  Lord  Mayor  and  Corporation  to  partake  of  a 
collation  prepared  for  them."  The  doors  of  an  adjoining  room 
were  thrown  open,  and  the  moment  the  enchanting  spectacle 
which  was  presented  by  a  splendid  banquet  was  disclosed,  at 
the  sight  of  "  cold  meats,  fowls,  turkeys"  (they  are  thus  enu- 
merated in  the  gazette  of  loyalty),  the  effect  was  sudden  and 
complete;  they  recovered  at  once  from  the  petrifying  power 
of  astonishment,  and  precipitated  themselves  upon  the  viands 
which  were  prepared  for  them,  with  a  voracity  which  well 
became  "the  ancient,  loyal,"  hungry,  and  bankrupt  Corpora- 
tion of  Dublin.* 

*  It  was  for  calling  it  "  a  beggarly  Corporation,"  in  1815,  that  Mr   D'Esterre 
challenged  Mr.  O'Connell  —  which  ended  in  his  own  death. —  M. 


THE   MANNERS   TESTIMONIAL 

Certain  of  the  bar,  consisting,  to  a  great  extent,  of  live  eter- 
nal perambulators  of  the  Hall,  have  recently  subscribed  for  % 
piece  of  plate,  which  is  to  be  called  "  The  Manners  Testimo- 
nial, or  Forensic  Souvenir."  It  was  originally  intended  to 
throw  the  contributions  of  the  profession  into  a  silver  cup,  where- 
with his  Lordship  might  deeply  drink  to  the  memory  of  King 
William  and  to  the  oblivion  of  himself;  but  it  was  discovered 
that  this  ingenious  idea  had  been  forestalled  by  the  Corpora- 
tion, and  it  was  determined,  after  mature  consultation,  to  pre- 
sent the  late  Chancellor  with  a  massive  salver,  upon  which  the 
principal  incidents  of  his  life  should  be  represented.  For  the 
purpose  of  completing  the  commemorative  donation,  it  became 
necessary  to  impose  a  new  rate  upon  the  loyalty  of  the  bar. 
To  this  proposition  the  Commissioners  of  Bankrupts,  notwith- 
standing their  obligations  to  his  Lordship,  were  at  first  strenu- 
ously opposed,  not  a  single  docket  having  been  lately  struck : 
but  upon  the  change  of  Ministry,  a  rumor  having  gone  abroad 
(hat  Lord  Manners  was  to  return  to  administer  justice,  as  he 
always  did,  indifferently  in  Ireland,  the  prudential  objections 
of  the  judicial  dignitaries  of  the  Royal  Exchange  were  laid 
aside.  A  sufficient  fund  has  been  collected,  after  a  good  deal 
of  application  to  the  political  virtue  and  individual  gratitude 
of  the  friends  and  admirers  of  Lord  Manners,  and  a  very  fine 
piece  of  plate  has  been  produced.  It  is  not  as  yet  quite  fin- 
ished ;  but,  through  the  interest  of  Sergeant  Lefroy  with  the 
pious  silversmith  to  whom  it  has  been  intrusted,  I  have  suc- 
ceeded in  obtaining  an  inspection.  The  salver  contains,  in 
exquisite  relief,  a  record  of  the  chief  adventures  of  his  Lord- 


186  TfiE   MANNERS    TESTIMONIAL 

ship's  judicial  and  political  life,  together  with  an  exemplifica- 
tion of  the  most  characteristic  traits  of  his  character.  If  a 
contemporaneous  commentary  were  not  published,  the  figures 
which  are  introduced  into  this  memorial  of  legal  sensibility 
might  hereafter  afford  as  much  matter  for  skeptical  speculation 
as  the  celebrated  shield  in  "  Martinus  Scriblerus."  With  a 
view,  therefore,  to  assist  the  curiosity  of  future  antiquarians 
some  account  of  "  The  Manners  Testimonial,  or  Forensic  Sou- 
venir," will  be  briefly  given. 

Upon  the  border,  the  busts  of  the  most  celebrated  members 
of  the  bar,  who  have  been  most  conspicuous  in  "  getting  the 
thing  up,"  are  admirably  embossed.     Mr.  Whytc  occupies,  of 
necessity,  a  very  considerable  space  in  this  part  of  the  testi- 
monial.    A  good  deal  of  dead  silver  has  been  employed  in 
doing  him  justice.     Exactly  opposite  to  Mr.  Whyte,  Mr.  Petei 
Fitzgibbon  Henchey  appears  with  that  look  of  egregious  dig- 
nity which  is  peculiar  to  him.     I  am,  however,  inclined  to  think 
that  the  artist  did  not  seize  him  at  the  most  felicitous  moment, 
for  there  is  a  touch  of  sadness  in  his  importance.     Perhaps  the 
funds  had  sustained  some  sudden  declination  at  the  time;  and 
the  battle  of  Navarino  has  left  its  traces  on  his  brow :  or,  per- 
adventure  (and  that  were  the  more  amiable  hypothesis),  Mr. 
Henchey  has  discovered  in   Sir  Anthony  Hart  a  lamentable 
inferiority  to  his  discriminating  predecessor,  and  an  unconsti- 
tutional disposition  to  lend  an  equal  attention  to  the  Catholics 
of  the  outer  and  to  the  Protestants  of  the  inner  bar.     The  rest 
of  the  heads  that  form  a  border  to  the  testimonial  are  very  ex- 
actly copied  from  most  of  the  King's  counsel,  whom  Lord  Man- 
ners left   as   an  appropriate  deposite  behind  him.     I   do  not 
know   why   Mr.  Perrin    and    Mr.  Richard   Moore   have  been 
omitted. 

But  it  is  upon  the  reliefs  in  the  body  of  the  salver  that  the 
greatest  skill  has  been  displayed  both  in  execution  and  in  de- 
sign. A  series  of  beautiful  biographical  illustrations  has  been 
introduced,  in  the  first  of  which  Lord  Manners  appears,  at  the 
English  bar,  with  an  empty  bag.  In  the  background,  the  Min- 
ister is  perceived  eying  him  from  a  distance;  while  the  Duke 
of  Portland,  who  seems  to  be   engaged  in  earnest  discourse 


LOED    MANNERS    AND    THE   JESUITS.  187 

with  the  official  detector  of  latent  desert,  points  with  one  hand 
to  the  House  of  Commons,  and  with  the  other  to  the  Bench. 

In  the  next  scene  his  Lordship  is  represented,  in  the  enact- 
ment of  the  part  of  Baron  Manners  at  the  Assizes  of  Lancaster, 
trying  the  case  of  Weld  v.  Hornby  (reported  in  7  East  195), 
when  his  Lordship  delivered  an  illegal  but  constitutional  charge 
against  the  Jesuits  of  Stonyhurst.     The  case  involved  the  right 
of  the  Jesuits  to  fish  in  the  river  Ribble,  and  it  is  surprising 
what  an  early  zeal  in  the  cause  of  Protestantism  was  displayed 
by  the  puisne  Baron,  who  was   afterward  intrusted  with  the 
selection  of  impartial  magistrates  in  Ireland.     In  the  execution 
of  this  relief,  great  ingenuity  has  been  evinced.     I  can  not, 
however,  say  that  the  workmanship  has  surpassed  the  mate- 
rials.    The  courthouse  is  filled  with  Jesuits.     They  are  with- 
out their  caps  and  gowns,  which   at  Stonyhurst  they  did  not 
presume   to   wear,   although    at  Clongowes   Wood,  under  Mr. 
O'ConnelFs   advice,  and   the   Solicitor-General's   opinion,  the 
body-guard  of  the  Pope  appear  in  full  regimentals.     Notwith- 
standing the  want  of  the  insignia  of  Loyolism,  it  is  easy,  from 
the  expression  of  their  faces,  to  detect  the  disciples  of  Ignatius. 
I  recognise  the  deeply-furrowed  face  of  Mr.  Plowden,*  in  which 
time  never  could  succeed  in  impairing  the  powerful  St.  Omer's 
physiognomy,  for  which  he  was  remarkable.     The  likeness  is 
so  faithful,  that  I   am  disposed   to  think  that  Mr.  Cruize,  who 
sprang  out  of  the  hot-bed  of  orthodoxy,  must  have  supplied  the 
artist  with  a  sketch  of  his  old  confessor.     The  very  able  chair- 
man of  the  county  of  Clare,  together  with  Mr.  Nicholas  Ball, 
who  is  rising  so   rapidly  to  the  first  eminence  at  the  bar,  are 
represented  among  a  group  of  boys  in  the  gallery  of  the  court- 
house.    I   think  that  I  can   also  discover,  in  an    acrimonious- 
looking  urchin,  who  is  taking  down  a  note  of  Baron  Manners' 
charge,  the  face  of  Mr.  Sheil.     The  Judge  is  in  the  act  of  addres- 
sing the  jury,  with  strong  indications  of  loyal  excitement,  over 

*  The  late  Frajicis  Plowden  was  an  Irish  barrister,  author  of  a  History  of 
Ireland,  popular  in  his  day.  He  wrote  two  or  three  other  books,  chiefly  on  le- 
gal subjects.  He  was  sued  for  a  libel  in  his  History,  and  cast  in  five  thousand 
pounds  sterling  damages,  rather  than  pay  which,  he  retired  to  France,  where 
he  died,  in  1829,  at  an  advanced  age. —  Mf 


188  THE    MANNEES    TESTIMONIAL. 

the  bench  in  which  he  presides.  The  artist  has  engraven  the 
significant  motto,  "  Qualis  abincepto."  In  the  perspective  there 
is  a  representation  of  the  English  Court  of  King's  Bench,  with 
Lord  Ellenborongh  laughing  grimly  at  the  misdirections  of  the 
learned  Judge,  whose  verdict  he  is  in  the  act  of  ignominiously 
setting  aside.  Some  of  Lord  Manners's  friends  objected  to  the 
record  of  this  early  incident  in  his  judicial  story  ;  but  it  was 
answered  that  the  illegality  of  his  opinions  was  more  than 
counterbalanced  by  his  zeal  for  the  constitution,  and  that  the 
evidence  of  his  inveterate  Protestantism  should  be  preserved 
at  the  expense  of  his  legal  reputation.  It  was  besides  observed, 
and  with  reason,  that  however  his  judgment  might  be  obscured 
by  his  emotions,  yet  the  purity  of  his  intentions  could  not  be 
brought  into  question. 

After  this  specimen  of  his  feats  upon  the  English  Bench,  the 
records  of  his  Irish  Chancellorship  appear.  He  is  represented, 
on  his  arrival  in  Ireland,  with  Mr.  Saurin  bidding  him  wel- 
come. An  earwig  is  seen  creeping  into  his  ear.  This  is  fol 
lowed  by  Lord  Manners  presiding  in  court :  Mr.  O'Connell  is 
addressing  him,  while  his  Lordship's  eye  is  averted,  and  his 
cheeks  are  filled  with  the  materials  of  a  puff,  which  the  learned 
Lord  is  preparing  to  discharge.  The  crier  of  the  court  is  seen 
lighting  the  fire  in  the  gallery,  and  throwing  Vesey  Junior  and 
the  Statutes  into  the  flames.  Various  views  of  impatient  adju- 
dication occupy  this  part  of  the  testimonial.  The  spirit  of  ju- 
dicial hurry,  for  which  his  Lordship  was  remarkable,  may  at 
first  view  appear  to  be  objectionable.  But  it  must  be  remem- 
bered that,  however  the  suitors  may  suffer,  the  counsel  are 
gainers  by  the  precipitation  of  a  Judge.  At  present,  for  ex- 
ample, Sir  Anthony  Hart  insists  that  due  consideration  shall 
be  given  to  every  cause  of  a  difficult  nature.  The  consequence 
is,  that  where  twelve  were  heard,  but  not  listened  to,  in  a  sin- 
gle day  by  Lord  Manners,  the  present  Chancellor  bestows  an 
equal  time  to  a  single  cause.  It  is  true  that  the  parties  are 
satisfied  by  his  decision,  and  the  occupation  of  Lord  Redes- 
dale  in  the  House  of  Lords  seems  likely  to  be  gone ;  but  the 
counsel's  fees  are  in  proportion  diminished  ;  the  crisp  paper  of 
the  Bank  of  Ireland  is  no  longer  seen  in  such  rapid  circulatiop 


JUDICIAL   MISDOINGS.  189 

through  the  inner  bar;  and  Sergeant  Lefroy  having  stated  his 
case  in  the  morning,  has  leisure  during  the  rest  of  the  day  to 
devote  himself  to  less  sublunary  pursuits,  and  may  exclaim 
with  Hamlet,  "  For  my  own  poor  part,  I  will  go  pray." 

I  dp  not  think  it  necessary  to  go  through  the  whole  of  the 
reliefs  which  are  intended  to  illustrate  Lord  Manners's  judicial 
excellences.  Dow's  parliamentary  cases  contain  an  ample 
commentary  on  his  faculties.  One  scene,  however,  in  the  tes- 
timonial, relating  to  this  portion  of  his  Lordship's  character,  is 
deserving  of  mention.  I  allude  to  the  case  of  "  Pirns,  minors." 
Lord  Manners  decided,  without  principle  or  precedent,  that 
the  infant  daughters  of  a  Catholic  mother  should  be  removed 
from  her  society  on  account  of  her  profession  of  the  illegal  reli- 
gion. The  artist  has  chosen  the  separation  of  Mrs.  Pirn  and 
of  her  family  for  the  manifestation  of  his  pathetic  powers. 
Lord  Manners  surveys  the  spectacle  of  domestic  anguish  with 
a  calm  philosophy,  in  the  expression  of  which  it  was  no  doubt 
intended  to  intimate  that  his  high  sense  of  public  duty  subdued 
in  his  Lordship's  mind  those  infirmities  to  which,  Avherever  the 
interests  of  Protestantism  were  concerned,  he  was  never  known, 
although  in  many  respects  a  kind  and  amiable  man,  to  give 
way. 

He  is  next  represented  in  his  capacity  of  Superintendent  of 
the  Magistracy  of  Ireland,  and  in  the  act  of  refusing  the  com- 
mission of  the  peace  to  Sir  Patrick  Bellew,  a  Roman  Catholic 
baronet  of  ancient  family,  and  of  considerable  fortune;  while 
the  description  of  individuals  whom  he  considered,  entitled  to 
that  important  trust  is  illustrated  by  a  group  of  pauper  justices 
in  the  county  of  Waterford,  who  are  seen  in  the  background. 
One  would  at  first  take  them  to  be  a  corps  of  the  Mendicity 
Association  ;  but  the  commission  of  the  peace,  which  is  seen 
sticking  out  of  the  rents  of  their  ragged  pockets,  indicates  their 
office;  while  the  lilies  that  hang  from  their  tattered  shirts  are 
beautifully  emblematic  of  their  constitutional  qualifications. 

His  Lordship  next  appears  as  a  member  of  the  House  of 
Lords.  He  is  seen  addressing  his  brother-peers  on  the  trial  of 
the  Queen,  Avhen  he  called  the  consort  of  a  King,  and  the  child- 
less mother  of  a  buried  Princess,  "  this  woman  !"     The  feeling 


190  THE   MANNERS    TESTIMONIAL. 

of  astonishment  and  disgust  which  pervades  the  House  is  well 
rendered.     Even  Lord  Lauderdale  himself  looks  surprised. 

Some  traits  of  his  Lordship's  domestic  history  succeed.  He 
is  represented  as  reading  Fox's  Martyrs  to  the  Honorable  Miss 
Butler,  and  reclaiming  her  from  the  errors  of  Popery  —  a  tem- 
ple of  Hymen  is  seen  in  the  distance. 

His  Lordship  is  afterward  introduced  at  dinner.  The  object 
of  this  relief  is  to  intimate  his  familiar  cast  of  religious  opin- 
ions. He  was  known  to  have  as  great  a  horror  of  a  thirteenth 
at  table  as  the  Chief-Baron  has  of  a  thirteenth  juror.  The 
artist  represents  his  Lordship  surrounded  by  the  ominous  num- 
ber, in  a  state  of  pious  dismay. 

This  dinner-scene  is  followed  in  natural  succession  by  a  ser- 
mon at  the  Asj^lum  in  Leeson  street.  But  there  is  nothing 
very  remarkable  in  it,  except  the  looks  of  profound  reverence 
with  which  "  the  Saints"  alternately  direct  their  attention  to 
the  pulpit,  which  is  occupied  by  Mr.  Daly,  and  the  pew  in 
which  the  Chancellor  is  engaged  in  his  devotions.  I  should 
not,  however,  omit  to  mention  that  the  face  of  a  Magdalen, 
peeping  through  the  bars  of  the  adjoining  receptacle  of  repent- 
ant loveliness,  at  Mr.  James  Smith  Scott,  is  beautifully  finished, 
and  that  the  mingled  expression  of  reproach  and  of  tenderness 
with  which  she  regards  him  is  admirably  rendered. 

But  I  find  that  I  am  dwelling  with  too  minute  an  accuracy 
upon  details ;  and  while  I  am  endeavoring  to  obviate  by  antici- 
pation any  doubts  which  may  occur  hereafter  to  the  learned, 
who  shall  survey  "The  Manners  Testimonial,"  I  forget  that  I 
run  the  risk  of  Avearying  my  readers  of  the  present  generation. 
I  must,  therefore,  pass  by  many  of  the  features  of  this  beauti- 
ful piece  of  art,  and  leave  them  to  puzzle  posterity. 

There  is,  however,  one  scene  of  splendid  conviviality,  on 
which  I  can  not  refrain  from  saying  a  word  or  two.  I  allude 
to  the  magnificent  relief  in  the  centre,  which  represents  a  meet- 
ing, at  Morisson's  Tavern,  of  the  Beefsteak  Club.  Lord  Rath- 
down,  better  known  as  Lord  Monk,  presides  over  the  Baccha- 
nalian confraternity.  This  is  a  wonderful  likeness.  The 
exact  look  has  been  preserved,  which  enabled  him  to  play  to 
admiration  in  the  private  theatricals  at  Kilkenny,  at  which  hl$ 


LORD    MONK,    IN    CHARACTER.  191 

Lordship's  name  appeared  among  the  dramatis  personce  in  the 
following  felicitous  announcement:  "Doodle,  a  foolish  lord, 
Lord  Monk."  The  noble  Earl  is  represented  in  that  felicitous 
moment  when  he  gave  as  a  toast,  "  The  Pope  in  the  pillory/' 
with  certain  additional  aspirations,  which  it  is  not  necessary 
to  record.  The  whole  assembly  of  sympathizing  compotators 
stand  with  uplifted  glasses,  replenished  to  the  brim.  The  Irish 
Chancellor  is  seen  at  the  right  hand  of  the  noble  and  intellect- 
ual chairman,  in  the  usual  "  hip,  hip,  huzza"  attitude.  A  ring, 
given  him  by  the  King  during  his  visit  in  Ireland,  sparkles 
on  his  finger,  and  he  tramples  the  King's  parting  letter*  under 
his  feet. 

*  In  this  missive,  written  by  Lord  Sidmouth,  as  Home  Secretary,  in  fhe 
name  of  George  IV.,  it  was  strongly  recommended  that  party  squabbles  shou]  1 
cease  and  liberality  of  thought  and  action  be  exercised  in  future. —  M. 


THE   CATHOLIC   DEPUTATION. 

The  Roman  Catholic  Association  having  resolved  to  petition 
the  House  of  Commons  against  the  Bill  which  was  in  progress 
for  their  suppression  [in  1825],  requested  Mr.  O'Connell  and 
Mr.  Sheil  to  attend  at  the  bar  of  the  house,  and  prayed  that 
those  gentlemen  should  be  heard  as  counsel  on  behalf  of  the 
body  in  whose  proceedings  they  had  taken  so  active  a  partici- 
pation.*    They  appeared  to  undertake  the  office  with  reluc- 

*  It  may  be  necessary  to  preface  this  sketch  with  a  rapid  view  of  the  posi- 
tion and  prospects  of  the  Catholic  question  at  this  time.  In  1823,  the  Catho- 
lic Association  was  formed,  and  was  in  active  operation  during  1824.  One 
result  was  that  it  literally  put  down  the  spirit  of  insurrection  which  had  crowded 
the  prison  with  inmates,  and  the  gallows  and  the  hulks  with  victims.  It  raised 
large  sums,  by  means  of  small  but  numerous  contributions  to  a  fund  called 
"  The  Catholic  Rent."  The  Government,  angry  and  jealous  that  the  Associa- 
tion had  restored  that  comparative  tranquillity  in  Ireland  which  its  own  harsh 
rule  had  been  unable  to  do,  resolved  that  "  it  must  be  put  down :"  —  and  more 
particularly,  as  the  general  proceedings  of  this  body  were  made  veiy  closely  tc 
resemble  those  of  the  Parliament  in  London.  Accordingly,  when  the  Session 
commenced,  on  February  3,  1825,  the  Ministerial  document  called  "The 
speech  from  the  Throne,"  suggested  the  suppression  of  the  Association ;  and 
Mr.  Goulburn,  who  was  Irish  Secretary,  obtained  leave  to  bring  in  a  Bill  for 
that  purpose,  on  that  day  week.  When  intelligence  of  this  reached  Dublin, 
the  Catholic  Association  resolved  that  a  Deputation  should  bo  sent  to  London 
to  watch  over  and  take  care  of  the  interests  of  the  Catholics.  Messrs.  O'Con- 
nell and  Sheil  were  specially  intrusted  with  this  duty  —  all  the  Catholic  Peers 
were  declared  members  of  the  Deputation,  which  farther  included  as  many 
members  of  the  Association  as  chose  to  swell  the  cavalcade.  Mr.  Goulburn's 
bill  was  introduced.  On  February  17,  1825,  Mr.  Brougham  presented  a  peti 
tion  from  the  Catholics  of  Ireland,  against  a  measure  winch  so  vitally  threatened 
their  inten  sts,  and  moved  that  they  be  heard  at  the  bar  of  the  house,  by  them- 
selves or  their  counsel,  in  opposition  to  the  Act.  This  motion  was  keenly  de- 
buted (as  is  described  by  Mr.   Sheil  in  the  text)  and  rejected  by  222   tO   18.9 


HOW    CONSTITUTED.  193 

tance.  It  involved  a  great  personal  sacrifice  upon  the  part  of 
Mr.  O'Oonnell ;  and,  independently  of  any  immediate  loss  in 
his  profession,  Mr.  Shiel  could  not  fail  to  perceive  that  it  must 
prejudice  him  in  some  degree  as  a  barrister,  to  turn  aside 
from  the  beaten  track  of  his  profession,  in  the  pursuit  of  a 
brilliant  but  somewhat  illusory  object.  It  was,  however,  next 
to  impossible  to  disobey  the  injunction  of  a  whole  people  — 
they  accepted  of  this  honorable  trust.  At  the  same  time  that 
counsel  were  appointed,  it  was  determined  that  other  gentle- 
men should  attend  the  debates  of  the  House  of  Commons  in 
the  character  of  deputies,  and  should  constitute  a  sort  of 
embassy  to  the  English  people. 

The  plan  of  its  constitution  was  a  little  fantastic.  Any  per- 
son who  deemed  it  either  pleasurable  or  expedient  to  attach 
himself  to  this  delegation  was  declared  to  be  a  member,  and, 
in  consequence,  a  number  of  individuals  enrolled  themselves 
as  volunteers  in  the  national  service.  I  united  myself  to  these 
political  missionaries,  not  from  any  hope  that  I  should  succeed 
m  detaching  Lord  Eldon  from  the  church,  or  in  banishing  the 
fear  of  Oxford  from  the  eyes  of  Mr.  Peel,*  but  from  a  natural 
curiosity  to  observe  the  scenes  of  interest  and  novelty,  into 
which,  from  my  representative  character,  I  thought  it  not 
improbable  that  I  should  be  introduced.     I  set  out  in  quest  of 

\  ":tes.  The  Association-suppression  bill  passed  rapidly  through  the  Commons  : 
reached  the  Lords,  on  the  first,  and  received  the  Royal  Assent  on  the  ninth  of 
March,  1825.  Almost  as  a  matter  of  course,  and  as  if  to  fulfil  O'Connell's  boast 
uat  he  "  could  drive  a  coach-and-four  through  any  Act  of  Parliament,"  a  new 
Catholic  Association  immediately  sprung  up  out  of  the  ashes  of  the  old. —  M. 

*  Peel  was  educated  at  Harrow,  where  Byron  was  his  schoolmate.  Thence 
he  went  to  Oxford  University,  where  he  graduated  with  the  highest  honors, 
rarely  conferred  upon  one  person,  though  his  successor  Mr.  Gladstone  also  won 
tuem.  He  took  what  is  called  "  double-first"  honors  —  i.  e.  in  classics  and 
i^ience.  When  Abbott,  the  Speaker,  was  raised  to  the  peerage  in  1817,  Pee* 
w-»e  elected  to  succeed  him  as  member  for  his  Alma  Mater,  and  retained  this 
if  sanction  (which,  on  account  of  his  support  of  Catholic  Emancipation,  Can 
ning  had  vainly  sighed  for,  as  he  confessed,  at  the  close),  until  1829,  when, 
ceasing  to  be  Peel  the  intolerant,  he  rendered  justice  to  the  Catholics,  and 
"Kas  defeated,  on  a  contest  for  the  seat  for  the  University,  by  Sir.  R.  H.  Inglis, 
a  man  of  small  ability  but  extensive  illiberality.  In  1825,  as  an  Anti-Catholic, 
Peel  was  popular  at  Oxford. —  M. 

Vol.  XL  — 9 


194  THE  CATHOLIC  DEPUTATION. 

political  adventure,  and  determined  to  commit  to  a  sort  of 
journal  whatever  should  strike  me  to  be  deserving  of  note. 
Upon  my  return  to  Ireland,  I  sent  to  certain  of  my  friends 
some  extracts  from  the  diary  which  I  had  kept,  in  conformity 
with  this  resolution.  They  told  me  that  I  had  heard  and  seen 
much  of  what  was  not  destitute  of  interest,  and,  at  their  sug- 
gestion, I  have  wrought  the  observations,  which  were  loosely 
thrown  together,  into  a  more  regular  shape;  although  they 
will,  I  fear,  carry  with  them  an  evidence  of  the  haste  and 
heedlessness  with  which  they  were  originally  set  down. 

The  party  of  deputies  to  which  I  had  annexed  myself  trav- 
elled in  a  barouche  belonging  to  Mr.  O'Oonnell,  of  which  he 
was  kind  enough  to  offer  us  the  use.  I  fancy  that  we  made 
rather  a  singular  appearance,  for  the  eyes  of  every  passenger 
were  fixed  upon  us  as  we  passed  ;  and  at  Coventry  (a  spot 
sacred  to  curiosity),  the  mistress  of  the  inn  where  we  stopped 
to  change  horses,  asked  me,  with  a  mixture  of  inquisitiveness 
and  wonder,  and  after  many  apologies  for  the  liberty  she  took 
in  putting  the  interrogatory,  "who  the  gentlemen  were?"  I 
contented  myself  with  telling  her  that  we  were  Irish.  "Par- 
liament folk,  I  suppose?"  to  which,  with  a  little  mental  reser- 
vation, I  nodded  assent. 

Mr.  O'Connell,  as  usual,  attracted  the  larger  portion  of  the 
public  gaze.  He  was  seated  on  the  box  of  the  barouche,  with 
a  huge  cloak  folded  about  him,  which  seemed  to  be  a  revival 
of  the  famous  Irish  mantle  ;  though  far  be  it  from  me  to  insin- 
uate that  it  was  ever  dedicated  to  some  of  the  purposes  to 
which  it  is  suggested,  by  Spenser,  that  the  national  garment 
was  devoted.  His  tall  and  ample  figure  enveloped  in  the 
trappings  that  fell  widely  round  him,  and  his  open  and  manly 
physiognomy,  rendered  him  a  very  conspicuous  object,  from  tho 
elevated  station  which  he  occupied.  Wherever  we  stopped,  he 
called  with  an  earnest  and  sonorous  tone  for  a  newspaper, 
being  naturally  solicitous  to  learn  whether  he  should  be  heard 
at  the  bar  of  the  house;  and,  in  invoking  "mine  host,"  for  the 
parliamentary  debates,  he  employed  a  cadence  and  gesture 
which  carried  along  with  them  the  unequivocal  intimations  cf 
his  country. 


BISHOP   MILNEK.  195 

Nothing  deserving  of  mention  occurred  until  we  had  reached 
Wolverhampton.  We  arrived  at  that  town  about  eight  o'clock 
in  the  morning,  with  keener  appetites  than  befitted  the  sea- 
son of  abstinence  [Lent],  during  which  Ave  were  condemned  to 
travel.  The  table  was  strewed  with  a  tantalizing  profusion 
of  the  choicest  fare.  Every  eye  was  fixed  upon  an  unhallowed 
round  of  beef,  which  seemed  to  have  been  deposited  in  the 
centre  of  the  breakfast-room  with  a  view  to  "lead  us  into 
temptation,"  when  Mr.  O'Oonnell  exclaimed,  "Recollect  that 
you  are  within  sacred  precincts.  The  conqueror  of  Sturges, 
and  the  terror  of  the  Vetoists,  has  made  Wolverhampton 
holy."  This  admonition  saved  us  on  the  verge  of  the  preci- 
pice—  we  thought  that  we  beheld  the  pastoral  staff  of  the 
famous  Doctor  raised  up  between  us  and  the  forbidden  feast, 
and  turned  slowly  and  reluctantly  from  its  unavailing  contem- 
plation to  the  lenten  mediocrity  of  dry  toast  and  creamless 
tea.  We  had  finished  our  repast,  when  it  was  suggested  that 
we  ought  to  pay  Doctor  Milner*  a  visit  before  we  proceeded 
upon  our  journey.  This  proposition  was  adopted  with  alacrity, 
and  we  went  forth  in  a  body  in  quest  of  that  energetic  divine. 
We  experienced  some  little  difficulty  in  discovering  his  abode, 
and  received  most  evangelical  looks  and  ambiguous  answers 
to  our  inquiries.  A  damsel  of  thirty,  with  a  physiognomy 
which  was  at  once  comely  and  demure,  replied  to  us  at  first 
with  a  mixture  of  affected  ignorance  and  ostentatious  disdain  ; 

*  At  this  time  (1825),  Dr.  John  Milner,  the  eminent  Catholic  controversial- 
ist, was  seventy-three  years  old  ;  he  died  in  1826. —  Born  in  1752,  he  completed 
his  education  at  Douay,  in  France,  was  ordained  a  priest  in  1777,  and  was  sta- 
tioned, two  years  after,  at  Winchester,  where  there  were  several  French  pris- 
oners who  were  Catholics.  In  1782,  he  published  a  funeral  discourse  on  the 
death  of  Bishop  Challoner,  and  became  a  voluminous  writer.  His  learning-, 
research,  and  skill,  as  an  Antiquarian,  were  displayed  in  his  History  of  the 
Antiquities  of  Winchester,  and  other  works  of  merit.  In  his  limited  History 
he  offended  the  prejudices  of  Dr.  Sturges,  a  prebendary  of  the  Cathedral,  who 
assailed  him  in  a  History  of  Popery,  to  which  the  reply  was  Milner's  well- 
known  Letters  to  a  Prebendary,  in  which  he  boldly  and  ably  defended  the 
Papal  Church.  He  had  a  somewhat  angry  discussion,  also,  with  Charles  But- 
ler, the  Catholic  barrister,  on  ecclesiastical  points.  In  1803,  Dr.  Milner  was 
appointed  Vicar-Apostolic  in  the  Midland  District  of  England,  and  removed 
to  Wolverhampton  —  he  was  now  Bishop  of  Castabala,  in  partibus.     In   1818 


196  THE   CATHOLIC   DEPUTATION. 

until  Sir  Thomas  Esmonde,*  who  is  "a  marvellous  proper" 
man  in  every  sense  of  the  word,  whether  it  he  taken  in  its 
physical  or  moral  meaning,  addressed  the  fair  votary  of  Wes- 
ley with  a  sort  of  chuck-under-the-chin  manner' (as  Leigh  Hunt 
would  call  it),  and,  bringing  a  more  benign  and  feminine  smile 
upon  a  face  which  had  been  over-spiritualized  by  some  potent 
teacher  of  the  word,  induced  the  mitigated  methodist  to  reply, 
"  If  you  had  asked  me  for  the  Popish  priest,  instead  of  the 
Catholic  bishop,  I  should  have  told  you  that  he  lived  yonder," 
pointing  to  a  large  but  desolate-looking  mansion  before  us. 

We  proceeded,  according  to  her  directions,  to  Dr.  Milner's 
residence.  It  had  an  ample  but  dreary  front.  The  windows 
were  dingy  and  covered  with  cobwebs,  and  the  grass  before 
the  door  seemed  to  illustrate  the  Irish  imprecation.  It  is  sep- 
arated from  the  street  by  a  high  railing  of  rusty  metal,  at 
which  we  rang  several  times  without  receiving  any  response. 
It  was  suggested  to  ns,  that  if  we  tried  the  kitchen-door,  we 
should  probably  get  in.  We  accordingly  turned  into  a  lane, 
leading  to  the  postern-gate,  which  was  opened  by  an  old  and 
feeble,  but  very  venerable  gentleman,  in  whom  I  slowly  recog- 
nised the  active  and  vigorous  prelate  whom  I  had  seen  some 
years  ago  in  the  hottest  onset  of  the  Veto  warfare  in  Ireland. 
His  figure  had  nothing  of  the  Becket  port  which  formerly  be- 
longed to  it.  A  gentle  languor  sat  upon  a  face  which  I  had 
seen  full  of  fire  and  expression;  his  eye  was  almost  hid  under 
the  relaxed  and  dropping  eyelid,  and  his  voice  was  querulous, 
undecided,  and  weak.  He  did  not  recollect  Mr.  O'Oonnell, 
and  appeared  at  a  loss  to  conjecture  our  purpose.  "  We  have 
come  to  pay  you  a  visit,  my  lord,"  said  Mr.  O'Oonnell.  The 
interpellation  was  pregnant  with  our  religion;  "my  lord," 
uttered  with  a  vernacular  richness  of  intonation,  gave  him  an 

he  published  his  "  End  of  Religious  Controversy,"  one  of  the  ablest  defences 
of  the  points  in  the  Catholic  faith,  to  which  Protestants  most  commonly  object. 
Bishop  Milner  was  an  amiable  and  pious  man,  and  much  beloved  in  the  dis- 
trict over  which  he  had  ecclesiastical  rule. —  M. 

*  Sir  Thomas  Esmondo  was  an  Irish  Catholic  baronet,  who  took  a  lively 
interest  and  an  active  part  in  Catholic  politics,  before  the  passing-  of  the  Relief 
Bill,  in  1829.— M. 


CHARLES    BUTLER.  197 

assurance  that  Ave  were  from  "  the  Island  of  Saints,"  and  on 
the  right  road  to  heaven  * 

He  asked  ns,  with  easy  urbanity,  to  walk  in.  We  found 
that  he  had  been  sitting  at  his  kitchen-fire,  with  a  small  cup 
of  chocolate,  and  a  little  bread,  which  made  up  his  simple  and 
apostolic  breakfast.  There  was  an  English  neatness  and 
brightness  in  everything  about  us,  which  was  not  out  of  keep- 
ing with  the  cold  but  polished  civility  of  our  reception. 

The  Doctor  was,  for  a  little  while,  somewhat  hallucinated, 
and  still  seemed  to  wonder  at  our  coming.  There  was  an 
awkward  pause.  At  length  Mr.  O'Oonnell  put  him  "aufait" 
He  told  him  who  he  was,  and  that  he  and  his  colleagues  were 
going  to  London  to  plead  the  cause  of  their  holy  religion. 
The  name  of  the  counsellor  did  not  give  the  Doctor  as  electric 
a  shock  as  I  had  expected  :  he  merely  said  that  we  did  him 
very  great  honor,  and  wished  us  every  success.  He  requested 
us  to  walk  up  stairs,  and  welcomed  us  with  much  courtesy,  but 
little  warmth.  Time  had  been  busy  with  him.  His  faculties 
were  not  much  impaired,  but  his  emotions  were  gone.  His 
ideas  ran  clearly  enough,  but  his  blood  had  ceased  to  flow. 
We  sat  down  in  his  library.  The  conversation  hung  fire.  The 
inflammable  materials  of  which  his  mind  was  originally  com- 
posed, were  clamped  by  age.  O'Oonnell  primed  him  two  or 
three  times,  and  yet  he  did  not  for  a  long  while  fairly  go  off. 

I  resolved  to  try  an  expedient  by  way  of  experiment  upon 
episcopal  nature,  and,  being  well  aware  of  his  feuds  with  Mr. 
Oharles  Butlert  (the  great  lawyer  and  profound  theologian  of 

*  In  the  mediaeval  ages,  when  the  rest  of  Europe  was  much  obscured  by  ig- 
norance, learning  was  largely  cultivated  in  Ireland,  which,  from  the  large  num- 
ber of  eminent  and  pious  ecclesiastics  which  she  then  produced,  was  called 
"The  Island  of  Saints."— M. 

t  Charles  Butler,  born  in  1750,  did  not  die  until  1832.  He  was  a  Catholi« 
who  had  closely  studied  the  law,  and,  as  a  conveyancer,  was  held  in  high  repute 
He  was  an  accomplished  scholar.  His  "  Notes  to  Coke  upon  Littleton"  are 
prized  by  black-letter  lawyers,  and  his  "  Reminiscences"  are  full  of  political, 
literary,  and  personal  information.  The  rest  of  his  works,  wbich  were  numer- 
ous, were  chiefly  ecclesiastical,  with,  now  and  then,  a  political  pamphlet.  His 
Lives  of  the  Saints,  Historical  Account  of  the  Laws  against  the  Roman  Cath- 
olics, and  his  Book  of  the  Catholic  Church,  excitt  i  groat  interest  when  the? 
appeared,  and  still  rank  as  standard  works. —  M. 


198  THE   CATHOLTC   DEPUTATION. 

Lincoln's  Inn),  asked  him,  with  much  innocence  of  manner, 
though  I  confess  with  some  malice  of  intent,  "whether  he  had 
lately  heard  from  his  old  friend  Charles  Butler1?"  The  name 
was  talismanic  —  the  resurrection  of  the  Doctor's  passions  was 
instantaneous  and  complete.  His  face  became  bright,  his  form 
quickened  and  alert,  and  his  eye  was  lighted  up  with  true  scho- 
lastic ecstasy.  He  seemed  ready  to  enter  once  more  into  the 
rugged  field  of  controversy,  in  which  he  had  won  so  many  lau- 
rels, and  to  be  prepared  to  "  fight  his  battles  o'er  again."  To 
do  him  justice,  he  said  nothing  of  his  ancient  antagonist  in  po- 
lemics which  a  bishop  and  a  divine  ought  not  to  say :  he,  on 
the  contrary,  mentioned  that  a  reconciliation  had  taken  place. 
I  could,  however,  perceive  that  the  junction  of  their  minds  was 
not  perfectly  smooth,  and  saw  the  marks  of  the  cement  which 
had  "  soldered  up  the  rift."  The  odium  tlieologicum  has  been 
neutralized  by  an  infusion  of  Christianity,  but  some  traces  of 
its  original  acidity  could  not  fail  to  remain.  He  spoke  of  Mr. 
Butler  as  a  man  of  great  learning  and  talents;  and  I  should 
mention  parenthetically  that  I  afterward  heard  the  latter  ex- 
press himself  of  Doctor  Milner  as  a  person  of  vast  erudition, 
and  who  reflected  honor,  by  the  purity  of  his  life,  and  the  ex- 
tent of  his  endowments,  upon  the  body  to  which  he  belonged. 
The  impulse  given  to  his  mind  by  the  mention  of  his  achieve- 
ments in  controversy,  extended  itself  to  other  topics.  Oobbett 
had  done,  said  Doctor  Milner,  service  to  Ireland,  and  to  its 
religion,  by  addressing  himself  to  the  common  sense  of  the 
English  people,  and  trying  to  purge  them  of  their  misconcep- 
tions respecting  the  belief  of  a  great  majority  of  the  Christian 
world.* 

The  Doctor  spoke  with  a  good  deal  of  energy  of  the  contests 

*  Cobbett's  "  History  of  tbe  Protestant  Reformation,"  had  an  immense  sale 
in  Great  Britain  and  Ireland,  was  repeatedly  and  largely  reprinted  in  Amer- 
ica, and  was  translated  into  several  European  languages.  It  is  full  of  interest 
—  partly  arising  from  tbe  number  and  variety  of  its  episodes  on  the  popular  top- 
ics of  the  day,  and  partly  from  the  manner  in  which  the  writer  showed  up  and 
condemned  the  spoliation  of  the  Anglican  Church,  by  Henry  VIII.,  when  he 
thought  that  "  Gospel  truth  first  beamed  from  Bullen's  eyes."  It  was  a  singu- 
lar book,  at  all  events,  for  a  Protestant  (which  Cobbett  professed  to  be)  to  have 
written. —  M. 


NATIONAL  CONTRASTS.  190 

wliicli  had  been  carried  on  between  the  clergy  and  the  itiner- 
ant missionaries  of  the  Bible  Society  in  Ireland,  and  congratu- 
lated Mr.  O'Connell  and  Mr.  Sheil  on  their  exertions  in  Cork, 
from  which  the  systematic  counteraction  of  the  new  apostles  had 
originated.*  Mr.  O'Connell  expressed  his  obligations  upon 
this  occasion  to  Doctor  Milner's  celebrated,  and,  let  me  add, 
admirable  work,  which  has  been  so  felicitously  entitled  "The 
End  of  Religions  Controversy."  —  "Oh  !"  said  the  Doctor,  "I 
am  growing  old,  or  I  should  write  a  supplement  to  that  book." 
After  some  further  desultory  conversation,  we  took  our  leave. 
Doctor  Milner,  who  had  been  aroused  into  his  former  energy, 
thanked  us  with  simple  and  unaffected  cordiality  for  our  visit. 
He  conducted  us  to  the  gate  before  his  mansion  (in  which  I 
should  observe  that  neither  luxury  nor  want  appear),  with  his 
white  head  uncovered,  and,  with  the  venerable  grace  of  age 
and  piety,  bade  us  farewell. 

We  proceeded  upon  our  journey.  No  incident  occurred  de- 
serving of  mention,  unless  a  change  in  our  feelings  deserves 
the  name.  The  moment  we  entered  England,  I  perceived  that 
the  sense  of  our  own  national  importance  had  sustained  some 
diminution,  and  that,  however  slowly  and  reluctantly  Ave  ac- 
knowledged it  to  ourselves,  the  contemplation  of  the  opulence 
which  surrounded  us,  and  in  which  we  sawthe  results  and  evi- 
dences of  British  power  and  greatness,  impressed  upon  every 
one  of  us  the  consciousness  of  our  provincial  inferiority,  and 
the  conviction  that  it  is  only  from  an  intimate  alliance  with 
Great  Britain,  or  rather  a  complete  amalgamation  with  her  im- 
mense dominion,  that  any  permanent  prosperity  can  be  reason- 
ably expected  to  be  derived.  In  the  sudden  transition  from 
the  scenes  of  misery  and  sorrow  to  which  we  are  habituated 

*  In  1824,  when  the  Protestant  Reformation  Society  held  a  public  meeting 
at  Cork,  a  great  deal  of  good  and  earnest  abuse  was  poured  out,  by  the  clerical 
speakers,  against  the  Catholics  and  the  Pope.  O'Connell,  Sheil,  and  other 
Catholics,  interrupted  the  proceedings,  demanding  to  be  heard,  on  the  principle 
of  fair  play,  in  defence  of  their  religion.  This  having  been  conceded,  they 
delivered  some  very  admirable  polemical  harangues,  which  the  Reformation 
party  did  not  even  attempt  to  answer.  It  was  considered,  therefore,  that  the 
Catholic  party,  wfco  remained  masters  of  the  field,  had  triumphed  in  the  con 
test. — M. 


IsOQ  THE    CATHOLIC    DEPUTATION. 

hi  Ireland  to  the  splendid  spectacle  of  English  wealth  and  civ- 
ilization, the  humiliating  contrast  between  the  two  islands 
presses  itself  upon  every  ordinary  observer.  It  is  at  all  times 
remarkable.  Compared  to  her  proud  and  pampered  sister, 
clothed  as  she  is  in  purple  and  in  gold,  Ireland,  with  all  her 
natural  endowments,  at  best  appears  but  a  squalid  and  emaci- 
ated beauty.  I  have  never  failed  to  be  struck  and  pained  by 
this  unfortunate  disparity;  but  upon  the  present  occasion  the 
objects  of  our  mission,  and  the  peculiarly  national  capacity  in 
which  we  were  placed  in  relation  to  England,  naturally  drew 
our  meditation  to  the  surpassing  glory  of  the  people  of  whom  we 
had  come  to  solicit  redress. 

An  occasional  visit  to  England  has  a  very  salutary  effect. 
It  operates  as  a  complete  sedative  to  the  ardor  of  the  political 
passions.  It  should  be  prescribed  as  a  part  of  the  antiphlogistic 
regimen.  The  persons  who  take  an  active  part  in  the  impas- 
sioned deliberations  of  the  Irish  people  are  apt  to  be  carried 
away  by  the  strength  of  the  popular  feelings  which  they  con- 
tribute to  create.  Having  heated  the  public  mind  into  an  ar- 
dent mass  of  emotion,  they  are  themselves  under  the  influence 
of  its  intensity.  This  result  is  natural  and  just :  but  among 
the  consequences  (most  of  which  are  beneficial)  which  have 
arisen  from  the  habitual  excitation,  and  to  which  the  Catho- 
lics have  reasonably  attributed  much  of  their  inchoate  success, 
they  have  forgotten  the  effect  upon  themselves,  and  have  omit- 
ted to  observe  in  their  own  minds  a  disposition  to  exaggerate 
the  magnitude  of  the  means  by  which  their  ends  are  to  be  ac- 
complished. In  declaiming  upon  the  immense  population  of 
Ireland.,  they  insensibly  put  out  of  account  the  power  of  that 
nation  from  whom  relief  is  demanded,  and  who  are  grown  old 
in  the  habit  of  domination,  which  of  all  habits  it  is  most  diffi- 
cult to  resign. 

A  man  like  Mr.  O'Connell  who,  by  the  force  of  his  natural 
eloquence  produces  a  great  emotion  in  the  midst  of  an  enthusi- 
astic assembly  of  ardent  and  high-blooded  men  —  who  is  hailed 
by  the  community,  of  which  he  is  the  leading  member,  as  their 
chief  and  champion  —  who  is  greeted  with  popular  benedictions 
as  he  passes  —  whose  name  resounds  in  every  alley,  and  "  stands 


EVIDENCES   OF   ENGLISH   WEALTH.  201 

rubric"  on  ever}  wall — -can  with  difficulty  resist  the  intoxica- 
ting influence  of  so  many  exciting  causes,  and  becomes  a  sort 
of  political  opium-eater,  who  must  be  torn  from  these  seductive 
indulgences,  in  order  to  reduce  him  into  perfect  soundness  and 
soberness  of  thought.  His  deputation  to  England  produced  an 
almost  immediate  effect  upon  him.  As  we  advanced,  the  din 
of  popular  assemblies  became  more  faint :  the  voice  of  the 
multitude  was  scarcely  heard  in  the  distance,  and  at  last  died 
away.  He  seemed  half  English  at  Shrewsbury,  and  was 
nearly  Saxonized  when  we  entered  the  murky  magnificence 
of  Warwickshire.  As  we  surveyed,  the  volcanic  region  of 
manufactures  and  saw  a  thousand  Etnas  vomiting  their  eternal 
fires,  the  recollections  of  Erin  passed  away  from  his  mind,  and 
the  smoky  glories  of  Skifton*  and  Wolverhampton  took  pos- 
session of  his  soul.  The  feeling  which  attended  our  progress 
through  England  was  not  a  little  increased  by  our  approach 
to  its  huge  metropolis.  The  waste  of  Avealth  around  us,  the 
procession  of  ponderous  vehicles  that  choked  the  public  roads, 
the  rapid  and  continuous  sweep  of  carriages,  the  succession  of 
luxurious  and  brilliant  towns,  the  crowd  of  splendid  villas, 
which  Cowper  has  assimilated  to  the  beads  upon  the  neck  of 
an  Asiatic  Queen,  and  the  vast  and  dusky  mass  of  bituminous 

*  Shifnal  is  the  name  of  the  place.  It  is  situated  between  the  busy  little  town 
of  Wellington,  in  Shropshire,  and  the  important  borough  of  Wolverhampton,  in 
Staffordshire.  Shifnal  is  only  important  as  being  the  centre  of  a  great  iron 
and  coal  district.  Travellers  to  and  from  Ireland,  via  Holyhead,  in  the  old 
time  of  mail-coaches,  used  to  be  startled,  on  a  dark  night,  in  rapidly  passing 
over  miles  upon  miles  of  a  road,  through  a  country,  where,  all  around  far  as  the 
eye  could  take  in  at  one  view,  immense  furnaces  flung  a  lm'id  light  through  the 
gloom  —  which  seemed  all  the  gloomier  by  contrast — and  hundreds  of  men 
flitted  to  and  fro,  feeding  these  furnaces  with  coal  or  throwing  in  heaps  of 
the  limestone  used  to  flux  the  liquid  iron  as  it  was  separated  from  the  ore  by 
heat.  The  sulphurous  smell,  from  the  immense  quantity  of  coal  thus  consumed, 
is  so  unpleasant  and  unwholesome,  that,  rather  than  inhale  it, 

"  The  boldest  held  their  breath, 
For  a  time." 

The  railway  from  Wolverhampton  to  Shrewsbury  passes  through  the  Shifnal  dis- 
trict—  but  travelling  at  forty  miles  an  hour  allows  not  much  more  than  a  few 
minutes'  glance  at  the  fiery  furnaces  I  speak  of.  This  is  the  scene  of  one  of 
the  most  touching  alventures  of  Dickens'  Little  Nelly. —  M. 

q* 


202  THE   CATHOLIC   DEPL  TATlOK. 

vapor  winch  crowns  the  great  city  with  an  everlasting  cloud, 
intimated  our  approach  to  the  modern  BaLylon. 

Upon  any  ordinary  occasion  I  should  not,  I  Lelieve,  have 
experienced  any  strong  sensation  on  entering  London.  "What 
is  commonly  called  "  coming  up  to  town,"  is  not  a  very  sublime 
or  moving  incident.  I  honestly  confess  that  I  have  upon  a 
fine  summer  morning  stood  on  Westminster  Bridge,  upon  my 
return  from  the  brilliant  inanities  of  Vauxhall,  and  looked 
upon  London  with  a  very  drowsy  sympathy  in  the  meditative 
enthusiasm  which  breathes  through  Wordsworth's  admirable 
sonnet.  But  upon  the  occasion  which  I  am  describing,  it 
needed  little  of  the  spirit  of  political  romance  to  receive  a 
deep  and  stirring  impulse,  as  we  advanced  to  the  great  me- 
tropolis of  the  British  empire,  and  heard  the  rolling  of  the 
great  tide  —  the  murmurs,  if  I  may  so  say,  of  the  vast  sea  of 
wealth  before  us.  The  power  of  England  was  at  this  moment 
presented  to  us  in  a  more  distinct  and  definite  shape,  and  we 
were  more  immediately  led,  as  we  entered  London,  to  bring 
the  two  countries  into  comparison.  This,  we  exclaimed,  is  Lon- 
don, and  the  recollection  of  our  own  Eblana*  was  manifest  in 
the  sigh  with  which  the  truism  was  spoken  :  yet  the  reflection 
upon  our  inferiority  was  not  unaccompanied  by  the  consolatory 
anticipation  that  the  time  was  not  distant,  when  we  should  be 
permitted  to  participate  in  all  the  advantages  of  a  real  and 
consummated  junction  of  the  two  countries,  when  the  impedi- 
ments to  our  national  prosperity  should  be  removed,  and  Ire- 
land should  receive  the  ample  overflowings  of  that  deep  cur- 
rent of  opulence  which  we  saw  almost  bursting  through  its 
golden  channels  in  the  streets  of  the  immense  metropolis. 

Immediately  after  our  arrival,  we  were  informed  by  the 
agent  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Association  in  London,  Mr. 
iEneas  M'Donnelt  (and   who.  in  the   discharge  of  the  duties 

*  Eblana  is  the  Latin  name  of  Dublin,  and  that  by  which  that  city  was  des- 
ignated in  early  law  documents. —  M. 

t  ./Eneas  M'Donnel,  who  had  been  editor  of  the  Cork  Mercantile  Chronicle, 
was  a  good  speaker  and  clever  writer,  who  soon  transferred  himself  to  Dublin. 
Taking  an  active  part  in  Catholic  politics,  he  was  appointed  salaried  agent  for 
the  Irish  Catholics,  and  sent  to  London.  He  performed  his  duty,  with  ability 
and  zeal,  until   1829,  when  Emancipation  was  granted.     From  that  time,  his 


SIR   FKANCIS   BURDETT.  203 

confided  to  him,  Las  evinced  great  talents,  judgment,  and 
discretion),  that  Sir  Francis  Burdett*  was  desirous  to  see  us  as 
soon  as  possible.  We  accordingly  proceeded  to  his  house  in  St. 
James's  Place,  where  we  found  the  Member  for  Westminster 
living  in  all  the  blaze  of  aristocracy.  I  had  often  heard  Sir 
Francis  Burdett  in  popular  assemblies,  and  had  been  greatly 
struck  with  his  simple,  easy,  and  unsophisticated  eloquence  : — I 
was  extremely  anxious  to  gain  a  nearer  access  to  a  person  of 
so  much  celebrity,  and  to  have  an  opportunity  of  observing  the 
character  and  intellectual  habits  of  a  man  who  had  given  so 

course  was  altered  by  his  applying  himself,  in  the  London  Standard  and  other 
ultra-Tory  Journals,  to  constant  abuse  of  Mr.  O'Connell,  on  the  plea  that  Irish 
agitation  ought  to  have  ceased  when  Emancipation  was  obtained.  Mr.  M'Don- 
nell  is  still  living,  and  resides  in  London. —  Lord  Nurbury,  who  never  could  re- 
sist a  joke,  on  seeing  M'Donncli  coming  out  of  the  house  of  Dr.  Troy,  the  Cath- 
olic Archbishop  of  Dublin,  exclaimed,  "  There  is  the  pious  iEncas  returning 
from  the  sack  of  Troy  !" — It  is  well  that  a  pun  need  not  involve  a  fact,  as  Dr. 
Troy,  who  was  the  reverse  of  Falstaff,  eschewed  sack  and  other  wines  —  his 
limited  resources  being  distributed  among  the  needy.  When  he  died,  the  sum  of 
a  guinea  was  all  that  was  found  in  the  purse  of  this  primitive  Archbishop. —  M. 

*  Sir  Francis  Burdett,  whose  rank  and  great  fortune  entitled  him  to  a  place 
among  the  British  Aristocracy,  was  a  most  violent  democrat,  from  his  starting 
into  public,  until  the  last  seven  years  of  his  life.  He  derived  his  political  bias 
from  Home  Tooke,  author  of  The  Diversions  of  Purloy.  Born  in  1770,  he  en- 
tered Parliament  in  1796,  and  immediately  opposed  Pitt's  Government.  With 
little  intermission,  he  had  a  seat  in  the  House  of  Commons  until  his  death  in  1844. 
Constantly  opposing  every  Tory  Ministry,  in  1810,  Burdett  having  published  a 
letter  to  his  constituents,  in  which  (in  no  veiy  measured  terms)  he  said,  that 
the  House  of  Commons  had  illegally  exercised  their  jiower  in  committing  Gales 
Jones  to  prison,  the  speaker  issued  his  warrant  to  apprehend  him  and  convey  him 
to  the  Tower,  for  "  gross  breach  of  privilege."  Burdett  barricaded  his  house 
in  London,  prepared  to  resist,  and  would  have  been  backed  by  the  populace, 
who  loved  him.  He  was  taken  to  the  Tower,  however,  and  confined  there 
until  the  prorogation  of  Parliament.  He  constantly  supported  liberal  measures, 
which  made  him  a  sort  of  Pariah  among  the  noble  and  the  wealthy,  and  sub- 
jected him  to  imprisonment  and  fine.  He  advocated  Parliamentary  Reform, 
and  Catholic  Emancipation  —  but,  in  1837,  "England's  pride  and  Westmiu 
feti_r'j  Glory,"  as  he  was  fondly  styled,  picking  a  quarrel  with  O'Connell,  went 
over  to  the  Tory  party,  and  continued  with  them  ever  after. —  He  married 
one  of  the  daughters  of  Thomas  Coutts,  the  rich  London  banker,  and  their 
daughter,  Angela  Burdett,  was  left  all  the  Coutts'  fortune,  by  the  banker's  sec- 
ond wife  (Harriet  Mellon,  an  actress),  whose  second  husband  was  the  Duke» 
of  St.  Albans.  —  M. 


204  THE  CATHOLIC  DEPUTATION. 

much  of  its  movement  to  the  public  mind.  He  was  sitting  in 
his  study  when  we  were  introduced  by  Mr.  M'Donnel.  He 
received  us  without  any  of  that  hauteur  which  I  have  heard 
attributed  to  him,  and  for  which  his  constitutional  quiescence 
of  manner  is  sometimes  mistaken.  We,  who  have  the  hot 
Celtic  blood  in  our  veins,  and  deal  in  hyperbole  upon  occasions 
which  are  not  calculated  to  call  up  much  emotion,  are  naturally 
surprised  at  what  we  conceive  to  be  a  want  of  ardor  upon 
themes  and  incidents  in  which  our  own  feelings  are  deeply 
and  fervently  engaged. 

During  my  short  residence  in  London,  I  constantly  felt 
among  the  persons  of  high  political  influence  to  whom  we 
approached,  a  calmness,  which  I  should  have  taken  for  the 
stateliness  of  authority  in  individuals,  but  that  I  found  it  was 
much  more  national  than  personal,  and  was,  in  a  great  degree, 
a  universal  property  of  the  political  world.  There  was  a 
great  deal  of  simple  dignity,  which  was  entirely  free  from  af- 
fectation in  the  address  of  Sir  Francis  Burdett.  Having  re- 
quested us  to  sit,  which  we  did  in  a  large  circle  (his  first 
remark  indeed  was,  that  we  were  more  numerous  than  he  had 
expected),  he  came  with  an  instantaneous  directness  to  the 
point,  and  after  a  few  words  of  course  upon  the  honor  conferred 
upon  him  by  being  intrusted  with  the  Catholic  question,  en- 
treated us  with  some  strenuousness  to  substitute  Mr.  Plunket 
in  his  place  ;  he  protested  his  readiness  to  take  any  part  in  the 
debate  which  should  be  assigned  him;  but  stated,  that  there 
was  no  man  so  capable,  and  certainly  none  more  anxious  than 
the  Attorney-General  for  the  promotion  of  our  cause.  But  for 
the  plain  and  honest  manner  in  which  this  exhortation  was 
given,  I  should  have  suspected  that  he  was  merely  performing 
a  part — but  I  have  no  doubt  of  the  sincerity  with  which  the 
recommendation  was  given. 

He  dwelt  at  length  upon  the  great  qualifications  of  Mr. 
Plunket  as  a  parliamentary  speaker,  and  pressed  us  to  waive 
all  sort  of  form  with  respect  to  himself,  and  put  him  at  once 
aside  for  an  abler  advocate.  We  told  him  that  it  was  out  of 
our  power  to  rescind  the  decision  of  an  aggregate  meeting. 
This  he  seemed  to  feel,  and  said   that  he  should  endeavor  to 


SIR   FRANCIS    BURDKTT.  205 

discharge  the  trust  as  efficiently  as  he  was  able.  His  heart, 
he  said,  was  in  the  question  —  he ►  knew  that  there  could  not 
be  peace  in  Ireland  until  it  was  adjusted  ;  and  for  the  country 
he  professed  great  attachment.  He  loved  the  people  of  Ire- 
land, and  it  was  truly  melancholy  to  see  so  noble  a  race  de- 
prived of  the  power  of  turning  their  great  natural  endowments 
to  any  useful  account.  These  observations,  which  an  Irishman 
would  have  delivered  with  great  emphasis,  were  made  by  Sir 
Francis  Burdett  almost  without  a  change  of  tone  or  look.  He 
made  no  effort  at  strong  expression.  Everything  was  said 
with  great  gentleness,  perspicuity,  and  candor.  I  thought, 
however,  that  he  strangely  hesitated  for  common  words.  His 
language  was  as  plain  as  his  dress,*  which  was  extremely  sim- 
ple, and  indicated  the  favorite  pursuit  of  a  man  wrho  is  "  mad 
at  a  foxchase,  wise  at  a  debate." 

I  watched  his  face  while  he  spoke.  His  eyes  are  small  and 
bright,  but  have  no  flash  or  splendor.  They  are  illuminated 
by  a  serene  and  tranquil  spirit :  his  forehead  is  high  and  finely 
arched,  but  narrow  and  contracted,  and,  although  his  face  is 
lengthy,  its  features  are  minute  and  delicately  chiselled  off. 
His  mouth  is  extremely  small,  and  carries  much  suavity  about 
it.  I  should  have  guessed  him  at  once  to  be  a  man  of  rank, 
but  should  not  have  suspected  his  spirit  to  be  a  transmigration 
of  Cains  Gracchus.  I  should  never  have  guessed  that  he  was 
the  man  whose  breath  had  raised  so  many  waves  upon  the 
public  mind,  and  aroused  a  storm  which  made  the  vessel  creak. 
I  saw  no  shadow  of  the  "  tower  of  Julius"  in  his  pure  and 
ruddy  color,  and  should  never  have  conjectured  that  he  had 
inhaled  the  evaporations  of  its  stagnant  moat.j  At  the  same 
time  I  should  observe  that,  if  there  were  no  evidences  of  a 
daring  or  adventurous  spirit  about  this  champion  of  the  peo- 
ple, there  are  in  his  demeanor  and  bearing  many  indications 
of  calm  resolve  and  imperturbable  determination. 

*  Summer  or  winter,  Burdett  appeared  in  the  House  of  Commons  in  one 
invariable  costume  —  broad-brimmed  hat,  blue,  brass-buttoned  coat,  drab 
breeches,  and  top-boots ;  the  regular  dress,  in  fact,  of  a  country-gentleman  fond 
of  field-sports. —  M. 

t  At  present,  the  moat  which  surrounds  the  Tower  of  London,  is  a  moat 
viinus  water. —  M. 


206  THE  CATHOLIC  DEPUTATION.. 

I  was  a  good  deal  more  occupied  in  watching  this  celebrated 
person  than  in  observing  my  companions.  Yet  I  at  once  per- 
ceived that  we  were  too  numerous  and  gregarious  a  body  for  a 
council  of  state,  and  was  glad  to  find  Mr.  O'Oonnell  take  a  de- 
cided, and  what  was  considered  by  some  to  be,  a  dictatorial 
tone  among  us.  I  saw  that  unless  some  one  individual  assumed 
the  authority  of  speaking  and  acting  for  the  rest,  we  should,  in 
all  likelihood,  be  involved  in  those  petty  squabbles  and  miser- 
able contentions  of  which  Bonaparte  speaks  as  characteristic 
of  the  Irish  deputies  who  were  sent  to  Paris  to  negotiate  a  rev- 
olution.* I  was  much  pleased  to  find  that  Mr.  O'Oonnell  gave, 
even  in  this  early  communication,  strong  proof  of  that  wise, 
temperate  and  conciliatory  spirit,  by  which  his  conduct  in 
London  was  distinguished,  and  by  the  manifestation  of  which 
he  conferred  incalculable  service  on  his  country. 

After  this  interview  with  Sir  Francis  Burdett,  the  chief  ob- 
ject of  which,  upon  his  part,  was  to  sound  our  disposition  to 
confide  the  conduct  of  our  cause  to  the  Irish  Attorney-General 
[PlunketJ,  we  proceeded  to  the  House  of  Commons,  for  the 
purpose  of  attending  the  debate  upon  the  petition  to  be  heard 
by  counsel  at  the  bar.  We  had  already  been  informed  by  Sir 
Francis  Burdett  that  it  was  very  unlikely  that  the  House  would 
accede  to  the  petition,  and  that  Ministers  had  collected  their 
forces  to  oppose  it.t     For  the  result  we  were  therefore  pre- 

*  Napoleon's  opinion,  as  reported  by  O'Meara,  is  unequivocal :  "  If  the  Irish 
had  sent  over  honest  men  to  me,  I  would  certainly  have  made  an  attempt  upon 
Ireland.  But  I  had  no  confidence  in  either  the  integrity  or  the  talents  of  the 
Irish  leaders  that  were  in  France.  They  could  offer  no  plan,  were  divided  in 
opinion,  and  continually  quarrelling  with  each  other." — M. 

t  Lord  Liverpool  was  at  the  head  of  that  Ministry;  Eldon  was  Chancellor: 
Peel,  Home  Secretary,  and  Mr.  Canning  the  only  member  of  the  Cabinet  who 
supported  Catholic  Emancipation.  The  petition  from  the  Catholics  of  Ireland 
was  intrusted,  not  to  Plunket,  who  had  constantly  and  ably  advocated  theii 
claims  (and  was  now  a  little  out  of  favor  because,  as  Irish  Attorney-General, 
he  had  supported  the  measure  for  putting  down  the  Association),  but  to  Burdett, 
who  presented  it,  March  1,  1825,  and  then  moved  for  a  committee  of  Catholic 
inquiry.  He  was  supported,  among  others,  by  Plunket,  Canning,  and  Brougham, 
and  strongly  opposed  by  Peel: — but  the  motion  was  carried  by  247  to  234  and 
the  Bill  eventually  passed  the  Commons.  But  between  the  first  and  second 
teadi  lgs,  the  Duke  of  York,  next  heir  to  the  Throne,  made  a  speech,  on  April 


THE    DUKE    OF    YOKE.  207 

pared ;  but  we  were  extremely  anxious  to  hear  a  discussion, 
in  which  Mr.  Brougham  was  expected  to  display  his  great  pow- 
ers, and  in  which  the  general  demerits  of  the  association  would 
in  all  probability  be  brought  by  Ministers  under  review.  The 
Speaker*  had  the  goodness  to  direct  that  the  Catholic  deputies 
should  be  allowed  to  sit  under  the  gallery  during  the  discus- 
sions which  appertained  immediately  to  the  object  of  their 
mission;  and  we  were,  in  consequence,  accommodated  with 
places  upon  this  vantage-ground,  from  which  I  had  an  oppor- 
tunity of  observing  the  orators  of  the  night.  We  found  a  con- 
siderable array  in  the  House,  and  attracted  universal  obser- 
vation. 

In  the  front  of  our  body  was  Mr.  O'Connell,  upon  whom 
every  eye  was  fixed.  He  affected  a  perfect  carelessness  of 
manner;  but  it  was  easy  to  perceive  that  he  was  full  of  rest- 
lessness and  inquietude  under  an  icy  surface.  I  saw  the  cur- 
rent eddying  beneath.  Next  him  was  Mr.  O'Gorman,  who 
carried  a 'most  official  look  as  secretary  to  the  Catholics  of  all 
Ireland,  and  seemed  to  realize  the  beau-ideal  of  Irish  self-pos- 
session.    (I   should  observe,  by-the-way,  that  Mr.  O'Gorman 

25,  1825,  in  which,  after  declaring  his  hostility  to  the  Catholic  claims,  he  pub- 
licly vowed  never  to  abate  it,  and  affirmed  this  declaration,  as  if  on  oath,  by 
the  concluding  words — "  So  help  me  God."  This  manifesto  led  to  the  loss  of 
the  measure  in  the  Lords.  In  Moore's  emphatic  poem,  "  The  Irish  Slave," 
written,  in  1827,  on  the  death  of  the  Duke  of  York,  he  thus  alluded  to  this 
vow:  — 

"  He  had  pledged  a  hate  unto  me  and  mine, 

He  had  left  to  the  future  nor  hope  nor  choice, 
But  sealed  that  hate  with  a  Name  Divine, 

And  now  he  was  dead,  and  —  I  couldn't  rejoice." 
The  Duke's  speech  was  delivered,  it  has  always  been  believed,  at  the  instiga- 
tion of  Lord  Eldon. —  M. 

*  The  Speaker  was  Charles  Mariners  Sutton,  who  held  that  office,  by  repeat- 
ed re-elections,  from  1817  until  1835,  when  he  was  opposed  by  Mr.  James 
Abercrombie,  a  Whig  lawyer  (and  steward,  or  sort  of  upper-servant  to  the 
Duke  of  Devonshire),  and  rejected  by  a  majority  of  ten.  The  ground  for  this 
opposiiion  and  rejection  was  a  surmise  that  Manners  Sutton  had  taken  an  active 
part  in  forming  the  Peel  Ministry,  in  December,  1834.  He  was  finally  created 
Viscount  Canterbury.  As  Speaker,  his  urbanity  of  manners  and  impartiality  of 
conduct  were  remembered,  when  too  late,  in  contrast  with  his  successor  Abor* 
crombie,  who  was  bearish  and  partial. —  M. 


208  THE  CATHOLIC  DEPUTATION. 

was  of  great  use  in  London  in  controlling  that  spirit  of  dispu 
tation  among  the  deputies  to  which  Irishmen  are  habitually 
prone,  and  which  it  required  the  perfect  good-humor  and  ex- 
cellent disposition  of  the  learned  functionary  to  assuage.) 

The  House  began  to  fill  about  eight  o'clock.  The  aspect 
of  the  members  was  not  in  general  very  imposing.  Few  were 
in  full  dress,  and  there  was  little,  in  the  general  demeanor  of 
the  representatives  of  the  people,  which  was  calculated  to  raise 
them  in  my  reverence.  This  absence,  or  rather  studious  neg- 
lect, of  ceremony,  is  perhaps  befitting  an  assembly  of  the  "  citi- 
zens and  burgesses  in  Parliament  assembled."  I  remarked 
that  some  of  the  members  were  distinguished  for  their  spirit 
of  locomotion.  The  description  of  "  the  Falmouth  —  the  heavy 
Falmouth  coach,"  given  by  a  jocular  Secretary  of  State,*  had 
prepared  me  to  expect  in  a  noble  Lord  a  more  sedentary  habit 
of  body ;  but  he  displayed  a  perfect  incapacity  to  stay  still,  and 
was  perpetually  traversing  the  House,  as  if  he  wished,  by  the 
levity  of  his  trip  and  the  jauntiness  of  his  movements,  to  fur- 
nish a  practical  reputation  of  ministerial  merriment. 

After  some  matters  of  form  had  been  disposed  of,  Mr. 
Brougham  rose  to  move,  on  behalf  of  the  Association,  that 
counsel  should  be  heard  at  the  bar  of  the  House.f     I  had  seen 

*  One  of  Canning's  elaborated  and  therefore  rather  dull  jokes  at  Lord 
Nugent,  who  was  stout  in  person,  having  gone  over  to  assist  the  Spanish  lib- 
erals, in  1822.     Lord  N.,  it  seems,  put  himself  into  the  Falmouth  mail. —  M. 

t  To  do  anything  like  justice  to  the  cyclopaediac  knowledge,  stirring  elo- 
quence, scientific  discoveries,  literary  productions,  philosophic  researches,  and 
public  services  of  Henry  Brougham,  the  great  law-reformer,  would  require  the 
compass  of  a  volume  rather  than  the  narrow  limit  of  a  note.  In  another  and 
future  publication,  perhaps,  I  may  be  tempted  to  trace  his  course,  and  sketch 
his  character. —  Born  in  Edinburgh  (No,  19  St.  Andrew's  Square),  on  Septem- 
ber 19,  1779,  he  was  called  to  the  Scottish  bar  at  an  early  age,  and  practised 
the~e  until  1807,  his  friends  and  companions  being  Jeffrey,  Cockburn,  and  oth 
ers  wno  have  attained  eminence.  Appealing  before  the  House  of  Lords,  in 
the  Roxburgh  peerage  case,  he  so  much  distinguished  bimself,  that  he  was 
6trongly  urged  to  leave  the  Scotch  for  the  English  bar,  which  he  did.  Hence- 
forth, his  course  was  one  of  increasing  distinction.  In  1810,  he  entered  Par- 
liament, on  the  liberal  side,  and  distinguished  himself  by  speaking  against  the 
Orders  in  Council,  which  caused  the  last  war  between  England  and  America. 
In  1820,  as  Attorney-General  to  Queen  Caroline,  he  successfully  defended  he* 


HENRY   BROUGHAM.  209 

Mr.  Brougham  several  years  before,  and  immediately  observed  a 
great  improvement  in  his  accomplishments  as  a  public  speaker. 
Nature  has  not,  perhaps,  been  very  favorable  to  this  very  emi- 
nent man  in  his  merely  physical  configuration.  His  person  is 
tall,  but  not  compact  or  well  put  together.  There  is  a  loose- 
ness of  limb  about  him,  which  takes  away  from  that  stability 
of  attitude  which  indicates  the  fixedness  of  the  mind.  His 
chest  is  narrow  —  he  wants  that  bulk  which  gives  Plunket  an 
Atlantean  massiveness  of  form,  mentioned  by  Milton  as  the 
property  of  a  great  statesman.  The  countenance  of  Mr. 
Brougham  wants  symmetry  and  refinement.  His  features  are 
strong,  but  rather  wide.  He  has  a  Caledonian  prominence  of 
bone.  His  complexion  indicates  his  intellectual  habits,  and  is 
"  sicklied  o'er  by  the  pale  cast  of  thought."  It  seems  smoked 
by  the  midnight  lamp.  His  eyes  are  deeply  sunk,  but  full  at 
once  of  intensity  and  meditation.  His  voice  is  good — it  is 
clear,  articulate,  and  has  sufficient  melody  and  depth.  He  has 
the  power  of  raising  it  to  a  very  high  key,  without  harshness 
or  discord,  and  when  he  becomes  impassioned  he  is  neither 
hoarse  nor  shrill. 

Such  is  the  outward  man ;  and  if  he  has  defects,  they  are 
not  so  numerous  or  so  glaring  as  those  over  Avhich  the  greatest 
orator  of  antiquity  obtained  a  victory.  In  his  ideal  picture  of 
a  public  speaker,  Homer  represents  the  most  accomplished 
artificer  of  words  as  a  person  with  few  if  any  personal  attrac- 
tions. The  characteristics  of  Brougham's  oratory  are  vigor 
and  passion.  He  alternates  with  great  felicity.  He  possesses 
in  a  high  degree  the  art  of  easy  transition  from  impetuosity  to 

in  her  trial  before  the  House  of  Lords.  In  1827,  he  liberally  supported  the 
Government  of  Canning,  with  whom  he  had  a  personal  quarrel  some  years 
before.  In  1830,  he  was  made  Lord-Chancellor,  on  Lord  Grey  coming  into 
power,  and  created  Baron  Brougham  and  Vaux.  He  had  strongly  supported 
Catholic  Emancipation,  and  he  now  battled,  with  immense  force,  against  the 
Aristocracy,  and  won  Parliamentary  Reform  for  the  People.  He  left  office  in 
November,  1834,  when  (at  the  instance  of  Queen  Adelaide  ?)  the  Melbourne 
Ministry  were  suddenly  dismissed  by  William  IV. —  He  has  not  since  taken 
office,  but  has  carried  out  Law  Reform,  has  been  active  in  varied  literary  and 
political  composition,  has  made  important  rescai'ches  in  science,  and  has  devo- 
ted himself,  in  the  Lords,  to  the  hearing  of  appeals  from  the  courts  of  law.  He 
is  now  [1854]  in  his  seventy-fifth  year,  hale  in  health  and  strong  in  mind, —  M 


210  THE  CATHOLIC  DEPUTATION. 

demonstration.  His  blood  does  not  become  so  over-lieated  as 
to  render  it  a  matter  of  difficulty  for  him  to  return  to  the  tone 
and  language  of  familiar  discourse  —  the  prevalent  tone  and 
language  of  the  House  of  Commons.  A  man  who  can  not  rise 
beyond  it  will  never  make  a  great  figure ;  but  whoever  can 
not  habitually  employ  it  will  be  accounted  a  declaimer,  and 
will  fall  out  of  parliamentary  favor.  Mr.  Brougham's  gesture 
is  at  once  senatorial  and  forensic.  He  uses  his  arms  like  an 
orator,  and  his  hands  like  a  lawyer.  He  employs  great  sweep 
of  action,  and  describes  segments  of  circles  in  his  impassioned 
movements  :  here  he  forgets  his  forensic  habitudes  :  but  when 
he  is  either  sneering  or  sophisticating,  he  closes  his  hands 
together  with  a  somewhat  pragmatical  air,  or  uniting  the 
points  of  his  forefingers,  and,  lifting  them  to  a  level  with  his 
chair,  embodies  in  his  attitude  the  minute  spirit  of  nisi  prius. 
If  he  did  this  and  nothing  else,  he  would  hold  no  higher  place 
than  the  eternal  Mr.  Wetherell  in  the  House.'*  But  what, 
taken  apart,  may  appear  an  imperfection,  brings  out  the  nobler 
attributes  of  his  mind,  and,  by  the  contrast  which  it  presents, 
raises  his  better  faculties  into  relief. 

Of  the  variety,  nay,  vastness  of  his  acquirements,  it  is  unne- 
cessary to  say  anything:  he  is  a  kind  of  ambulatory  encyclo- 
pedia, and  brings  his  learning  to  bear  upon  every  topic  on 
which  he  speaks.  His  diction  is  highly  enriched,  or,  if  I  may 
so   say,  embossed   with   figures  executed   after  the  pure  clas- 

*  Sir  Charles  Wetherell  was  made  Solicitor-General  in  1821.  Born  in  1770 
he  was  called  to  the  bar  in  1794,  and  practised  for  some  time  at  the  common 
law  bar,  but  settled  down,  finally,  into  immense  practice  in  chancery.  He  en- 
tered Parliament  in  1818,  and  his  careless  dress,  eccentric  manner,  and  extra- 
ordinary way  of  speaking-  made  him  more  noted  than  eminent.  In  1827,  when 
Copley  (now  Lord  Lyndhurst)  was  made  Master  of  the  Rolls,  he  was  succeeded 
as  Attorney-General  by  Wetherell,  who  resigned,  in  1829,  on  the  Catholic  Re 
lief  Bill  being  brought  in  without  consulting  him,  the  first  law  officer  of  the 
Crown.  He  opposed  Catholic  Emancipation  and  Parliamentary  Reform,  and 
quitted  Parliament  when  the  latter  measure  was  passed.  In  the  autumn  of 
1831,  when  he  was  unpopular,  as  an  anti-Reformer,  he  appeared  at  Bristol  to 
hold  the  Sessions,  as  Recorder  of  that  city.  He  was  mobbed,  narrowly  escaping 
with  his  life,  and  Bristol  was  the  scene  of  dreadful  riots,  burning,  and  otber 
devastations  for  the  following  day  and  night.  He  was  one  of  the  best  equity 
lawyers  of  his  time.     He  died  immensely  rich,  in  184G,  aged  seventy-six. —  1VJ 


PEEL    AND    HAMILTON    BOW  AN.  211 

sical  model ;  yet  there  are  not,  perhaps,  any  isolated  passages 
which  are  calculated  to  keep  a  permanent  residence  in  the 
recollection  of  his  hearers.  He  does  not  venture,  like  Plunket, 
into  .the  loftiest  regions  of  eloquence;  he  does  not  wing  his 
flight  among  those  towering  elevations  which  are,  perhaps,  as 
barren  as  they  are  high  ;  but  he  holds  on  with  steady  conti- 
nuity in  a  very  exalted  course,  and  never  goes  out  of  sight. 
His  bursts  of  honest  vehemence,  and  indignant  moral  reproba- 
tion, are  very  fine.  He  furnished,  upon  the  night  on  which  I 
heard  him,  an  admirable  exemplification  of  this  commanding 
power.  I  allude  to  his  reply  to  Mr.  Peel  upon  the  charges 
made  against  Hamilton  Rowan* 

The  Secretary  for  the  Home  Department  is  said  to  have 
delivered,  upon  this  occasion,  one  of  the  best  speeches  which 
he  ever  pronounced  in  parliament.  I  own  that  he  greatly  sur- 
passed my  expectations.  I  was  prepared,  from  the  perusal  of 
his  speeches,  and  the  character  which  I  had  heard  of  him,  for 
a  display  of  frigid  ingenuity,  delivered  with  a  dapper  neatness 
and  an  ironical  conceit.  I  heard  the  late  Mr.  Curran  say  that 
"  Peel  was  a  mere  official  Jack-an-apes,"  and  had  built  my 
conceptions  of  him  upon  a  phrase  which,  valueless  as  it  may 
appear,  remained  in  my  memory.  But  I  was  disabused  of  this 
erroneous  impression  by  his  philippic  against  the  Association. 

*  Peel  was  hurried,  by  the  ardor  of  debate,  when  denouncing  the  Catholic 
Association,  to  accuse  that  body  of  having-  presented  an  address  to  Archi 
bald  Hamilton  Rowan,  "  an  attainted  traitor."  Mr.  Rowan  had  been  Secretary 
to  the  United  Irishmen.  In  1794,  he  was  tried  for  libel,  defended  by  Curran 
(in  one  of  the  most  eloquent  speeches  ever  made,  even  by  him),  convicted,  fined, 
and  imprisoned.  While  suffering  this  sentence,  he  ascertained  that  his  com- 
plicity in  the  intended  "  rebellion"  had  been  disclosed  to  the  Executive,  and 
then,  as  is  subsequently  told,  he  escaped  to  France,  and  thence  to  America, 
where  he  maintained  himself  by  the  labor  of  his  head  and  hands.  Lord  Chan- 
cellor Clare  secured  his  pardon,  hut  did  not  live  to  see  Rowan's  return.  In 
1805,  he  came  back  to  Ireland,  was  formally  arraigned  at  the  bar  of  justice,  be- 
fore Lord  Clonmel,  and  pleaded  the  King's  pardon,  briefly  but  eloquently  ex- 
pressing his  gratitude  for  the  boon.  He  retired  into  the  bosom  of  domestic 
life,  living  on  his  large  fortune.  When  Peel  went  out  of  his  way  to  assail  him, 
Mr.  Rowan,  though  then  seventy-five  years  old,  immediately  went  from  Ireland 
to  London,  to  call  him  to  account,  but  Peel  frankly  withdrew  the  expressions, 
and  they  parted,  with  a  mutual  sense  of  "  satisfaction,"  other  than  that  sought 
by  the  veteran. —  M. 


212  THE  CATHOLTC  DEPUTATION. 

I  do  not  mean  to  say  that  Mr.  Peel  Las  not  a  good  deal  of 
elaborate  self-sufficiency.  He  is  perpetually  indulging  in  en- 
comiums upon  his  own  manliness  and  candor  —  and  certainly 
there  is  much  frankness  in  his  voice  and  bearing — but  any 
man  who  observes  the  expedients  with  which  he  endeavors  to 
effect  his  escape  from  the  grasp  of  some  powerful  opponent, 
will  be  convinced  that  there  is  a  good  deal  of  lubricity  about 
him.  He  constantly  advances  arguments  of  the  fallacy  of 
which  he  can  not  fail  to  be  conscious,  and  which  would  be  a 
burlesque  upon  reasoning  if  they  were  not  uttered  from  the 
Treasury  Bench. 

As  a  speaker,  he  should  not  be  placed  near  Brougham,  or 
Canning,  or  Plunket,  although  he  rises  far  beyond  that  medi- 
ocrity to  which  in  Ireland  we  are  in  the  habit  of  condemning 
him.  His  language  is  not  powerful,  but  it  is  perfectly  clear, 
and  uniformly  correct.  I  observed,  indeed,  that  his  sentences 
were  much  more  compact  and  unbroken,  and  their  several 
parts  better  linked  together,  than  those  of  Mr.  Brougham  ;  but 
the  one  evolves  his  thoughts  in  a  lengthened  and  winding 
chain,  while  the  other  (having  a  clue  fear  of  the  parenthetical 
before  his  eyes)  presents  an  obvious  idea  in  a  brief  and  simple 
form,  and  never  ventures  to  frame  any  massive  or  extended 
series  of  phrase.  His  gesture  is,  generally  speaking,  exceed- 
ingly appropriate,  and  if  I  found  any  fault  with  it,  I  should 
censure  it  for  its  minute  adherence  to  grace.  His  hands  are 
remarkably  white  and  well  formed,  and  are  exhibited  with  an 
ostentatious  care.  He  stands  erect,  and,  to  use  a  technical 
expression  employed  by  French  dancers,  "  a-plomb."  Thir 
firmness  of  attitude  gives  him  that  appearance  of  determina- 
tion, which  is  wanting  perhaps  in  Mr.  Brougham. 

I  do  not  like  his  physiognomy  as  an  orator.  He  has  a 
handsome  face,  but  it  is  suffused  with  a  smile  of  sleek  self- 
complacency,  which  it  is  impossible  to  witness  without  dis 
taste.  He  has  also  a  trick  of  closing  his  eyes,  which  may 
arise  from  their  weakness,  but  which  has  something  mental  in 
its  expression  ;  and,  however  innocent  he  may  be  of  all  offen 
sive  purpose,  is  indicative  of  superciliousness  and  contempt 
I  doubt  not  he  found  it  of  use  in  Ireland   among  the  menials 


PEEL    AND    o'cONNELL.  213 

of  authority,  and  acquired  tins  habit  at  the  Castle.  In  one, 
the  best  passage  in  his  speech,  and  I  believe  the  best  he  ever 
uttered,  he  divested  himself  of  those  defects. 

Upon  the  moral  propriety  of  his  attack  upon  Hamilton 
Rowan  it  is  unnecessary  to  say  anything.  The  misfortunes 
of  that  excellent  gentleman  ought  not  to  have  been  pressed 
into  the  service.  After  every  political  convulsion,  a  Lethe 
should  be  permitted  to  flow  upon  the  public  mind,  and  a  sin 
of  thirty  years'  standing  ought  not  only  to  be  pardoned,  but 
forgotten.  Mr.  Peel,  however,  could  not  resist  the  temptation 
of  dragging  upon  the  stage  a  man  whose  white  hair  should 
hide  every  imperfection  upon  his  head.  Laying  aside  all 
consideration  of  the  generosity  evinced  by  Mr.  Peel  in  the 
selection  of  the  topic,  it  must  be  acknowledged  that  he  pro- 
nounced his  invective  with  great  and  very  successful  force. 
He  became  heated  with  victory,  and,  cheered  as  he  was 
repeatedly  by  his  multitudinous  partisans,  turned  suddenly 
toward  the  part  of  the  house  where  the  deputies  were  seated, 
and  looking  triumphantly  at  Mr.  O'Oonnell,  with  whom  he  for- 
got for  a  moment  that  he  had  been  once  involved  in  a  personal 
quarrel,*  shook  his  hand  with  scornful  exultation,  and  asked 

*  In  1815,  the  late  Sir  Robert  Peel,  then  Secretary  for  Ireland,  consid- 
ered himself  insulted  by  some  expressions  in  a  speech  made  by  Mr.  O'Connell, 
and  challenged  him.  It  was  agreed  that  the  duel  should  take  place  in  France, 
whither  Peel  went,  but,  as  O'Connell  was  in  London,  en  route  to  the  assigned 
battle-ground,  the  object  of  his  journey  transpired,  the  police  interfered,  he 
was  bound  over  to  keep  the  peace,  and  the  duel  was  thus  prevented.  (The 
late  Dr.  England,  Catholic  Bishop  of  Charleston,  S.  C,  who  then  resided  at 
Cork,  pointed  out  the  conjunct  sin  and  folly  of  duelling,  when  he  next  met 
O'Connell,  and  induced  him  to  give  a  solemn  promise  that,  under  no  circum- 
stances would  he  again  Appeal  to  arms.)  It  was  whispered,  at  the  time,  that 
O'Connell  might  have  passed  over  to  France,  undetected,  if  he  had  not  delayed 
in  London,  to  receive  news  of  the  health  of  his  wife,  whom  he  had  left  very  ill 
in  Dublin.  Another  public  character  had  declined  a  challenge  at  the  same 
time,  on  the  plea  of  his  daughter's  illness,  and  the  two-fold  occurrence  elicited 
the  following  impromptu  from  Charles  Kendal  Bushe  :  — 

"  Two  heroes  of  Erin,  abhorrent  of  slaughter, 
Improved  on  the  Hebrew  command  — 
One  honored  his  wife  and  the  other  his  daughter, 
That  '  their  days  might  be  long  in  the  land.' " 
In  Willis's  "  Pencillings  by  the  Way"  (one  of  the  most  delightful  books  of  trov 


214  THE   CATHOLIC   DEPUTATION. 

whether  the  House  required  any  better  evidence  than  the 
address  of  the  Association  to  "an  attainted  traitor."  The 
phrase  was  well  uttered,  and  the  effect  as  a  piece  of  oratory- 
was  great  and  powerful.  But  for  the  want  of  moral  dignity,  I 
should  say  that  it  was  very  finely  executed.* 

We  hung  down  our  heads  for  a  moment  and  quailed,  under 
the  consciousness  of  defeat.  But  it  was  only  temporary.  Mr. 
Brougham  was  supplied  with  various  facts  of  great  importance 
on  the  instant,  and  inflicted  upon  Mr.  Peel  a  terrible  retribu- 
tion. His  reply  to  the  minister  was,  I  understand,  as  effective 
as  his  celebrated  retort  upon  the  Queen's  letters.  He  showed 
that  the  Government  had  extended  to  Mr.  Rowan  conspicuous 
marks  of  favor,  and  reproached  Mr.  Peel  with  his  want  of 
nobleness  in  opening  a  wound  which  had  been  so  long  closed, 
and  in  turning  the  disasters  of  an  honorable  man  into  a  rhetor- 
ical resource.  He  got  hold  of  the  good  feeling  of  the  House. 
Their  virtuous  emotions,  and  those  high  instincts  which  even 
the  spirit  of  party  can  not  entirely  suppress,  were  at  once  mar- 
shalled upon  his  side.  Conscious  of  his  advantage,  he  rushed 
upon  his  antagonist  and  hurled  him  to  the  ground.  He  dis- 
played upon  this  occasion  the  noblest  qualities  of  his  elo- 
quence—  fierce  sarcasm,  indignant  remonstrance,  exalted  sen- 
timent, and  glowing  elocution.     He  brought  his  erudition  to 

elled  observation  and  personal  gossip)  a  different  version  of  this  epigram  is 
given,  as  related  by  Moore,  not  so  neatly  turned  as  the  above.  The  O'Connell 
family  were  very  angry  with  Moore  for  having  repeated  the  lines ;  and  Mrs. 
Fitzsimon,  one  of  O'Conncll's  daughters,  recorded  her  indignation  in  some 
powerful  stanzas,  written  in  the  album  of  Samuel  Lover,  the  Irish  lyrist. —  Bushe, 
the  real  delinquent,  had  a  knack  in  this  way.  Once  upon  a  time,  the  members 
of  the  Leinster  bar  were  prevented,  by  a  violent  storm,  from  crossing  a  ferry  at 
Ballinlaw.  Mr.  Caesar  Colclough,  heedless  of  danger'  flung  his  saddle-bags  into 
the  boat,  and  desired  the  man  to  row  him  over.  Bushe  thus  caught  him  in  an 
impromptu  — 

"  While  meaner  souls  the  tempest  keeps  in  awe, 
Intrepid  Caesar,  crossing  Ballinlaw, 
Shouts  to  the  boatman,  shivei-ing  in  his  rags 
*  You  carry  Caesar  and  his  —  saddle-bags  /'  " — M. 

*  I  had  intended  to  introduce  a  sketch  of  Mr.  Rowan's  character  into  this  ar 
tide,  but  found  that  I  could  not  compress  it  within  its  appropriate  limits.  The 
reader  will  find  it  appended  in  a  separate  article. 


MEMORIALS   OF   PEEL.  215 

Ins  aid,  and  illustrated  his  defence  by  a  quotation  from  Cicero, 
in  which  the  Roman  extenuates  the  faults  of  those  who  were 
engaged  on  Pompey's  side.  The  passage  was  exceedingly 
apposite,  but  was  delivered,  perhaps,  with  too  dolorous  and 
lacrymatory  a  tone.  A  man  should  scarcely  weep  over  a 
quotation.  But  altogether  the  reply  was  magnificent,  and 
made  the  minister  bite  the  dust.*  With  this  comfortable 
reflection  we  left  the  house. 

*  The  late  Sir  Robert  Peel,  born  in  1788,  was  the  son  of  a  man  who  had  be- 
come a  millionaire,  as  an  enterprising  cotton-manufacturer.  Educated  fa 
political  life,  young  Peel  entered  Parliament  in  1809  (having  previously  had 
tbe  unusual  distinction  of  winning  a  "  double-first  class"  degree  at  Oxford), 
and  soon  was  noticed  as  a  well-informed  and  judicious  speaker  and  workev. 
In  1810,  he  was  made  Colonial  under-secretary,  Percival  being  Premier.  From 
1812  to  1818,  he  was  Chief-Secretary  for  Ireland.  In  1822,  he  succeeded 
Addington  (Lord  Sidmouth)  as  Home  Secretaiy,  and,  in  that  capacity,  com- 
menced the  mitigation  and  consolidation  of  the  criminal  law.  When  Canning 
became  Premier,  in  1827,  Peel  and  five  other  Cabinet  ministers  resigned.  In 
1828,  when  Wellington  formed  his  ministry,  Peel  was  his  Home  Secretary,  and, 
as  such,  introduced  and  carried  the  Catholic  Relief  Bill  in  1829,  thereby  incur- 
ring the  enmity  of  the  great  Tory  exclusionist  party.  From  1830  to  1834,  Peel 
headed  the  opposition  to  Lord  Grey's  Reform  Ministry,  and  was  summoned 
from  Italy,  at  the  close  of  the  latter  year,  to  form  a  ministry  which  was  broken 
up  in  April,  1835.  The  Whigs  resumed  office,  and  retained  it  until  the  sum- 
mer of  1841,  when  Lord  Melbourne  had  to  relinquish  his  position  as  Premier, 
and  Peel  succeeded  him,  amid  general  hope,  from  \  ublic  confidence  in  his  ad- 
ministrative faculties,  that  he  would  extricate  the  com  try  from  the  financial  and 
other  difficulties  in  which  the  Melbourne  Cabinet  had  involved  it.  He  imposed 
an  Income  and  Property  tax  (the  best,  if  fairly  assessed),  and  in  1842,  com- 
menced his  system  of  Free  Trade,  by  sweeping  away  hundreds  of  imposts  — 
most  of  them  small,  but  all  vexatious.  In  1845,  he  announced  Free  Trade  in 
Corn,  to  the  joy  of  millions,  who  were  led  to  expect  more  from  it  than  they 
have  yet  received,  and  to  the  dismay  and  anger  of  the  landlords  and  farmers, 
who  had  looked  on  Peel  as  their  great  bulwark.  The  Corn  Laws  were  abol- 
ished in  June,  1846,  and,  immediately  after,  the  Whigs  and  the  Protectionists 
uniting  to  oppose  Peel,  beat  him  on  the  Irish  Coercion  Bill,  and  forced  him  to 
retire.  On  June  29,  1846,  he  announced  the  dissolution  of  his  ministry,  in 
one  of  the  ablest  speeches  he  had  ever  delivered,  and  quitted  office,  the  peo- 
ple's favorite.  For  the  following  four  years,  his  influence  in  public  affairs  was 
immense.  He  was  understood  not  to  desire  a  return  to  office  —  but  he  wielded 
immense  moral  power.  On  June  29,  1850,  he  was  thrown  off  his  horse,  while 
riding  up  Constitution  Hill  (London)  and  died  from  the  effects  of  the  fall  on 
July  2,  1850,  mourned  by  the  nation.  All  felt  his  loss  —  from  the  sovereign  to 
;he  peasant.     From  the  time  that  he  threw  off  the  trammels  of  party,  Peel  waa 


216  THE  CATHOLIC  DEPUTATION". 

It  is  not,  of  course,  my  intention  to  detail  every  circum- 
stance of  an  interesting  kind  which  occurred  in  the  course  of 
this  political  excursion.  From  a  crowd,  of  materials,  I  select 
what  is  most  deserving  of  mention.  I  should  not  omit  the 
mention  of  a  dinner  given  to  the  deputies  by  Mr.  Brougham. 
He  invited  us  to  his  house  upon  the  Saturday  after  our  arrival, 
and  gave  the  Irish  embassy  a  very  splendid  entertainment. 
Some  of  the  first  men  in  England  were  of  the  party.  There 
were  four  Dukes  at  table.  I  had  never  witnessed  an  assem- 
blage of  so  much  rank,  and  surve}7ed  with  intense  curiosity 
the  distinguished  host  and  his  illustrious  guests.  It  is  unne- 
cessary to  observe  that  Mr.  Brougham  went  through  the  rou- 
tine of  convivial  form  with  dignified  facility  and  grace.  It 
was  to  his  mind  that  I  directed  my  chief  attention,  with  a 
view  to  compare  him,  in  his  hours  of  relaxation,  with  the  men 
of  eminence  with  whom  I  had  conversed  in  my  own  country. 

The  first  circumstance  that  struck  me  was  the  entire  absence 
of  effort,  and  the  indifference  about  display.  I  perceived  that 
he  stretched  his  faculties  out,  after  the  exhaustion  of  profes- 
sional and  parliamentary  labor,  in  a  careless  listlessness; 
and,  if  I  may  so  say,  threw  his  mind  upon  a  couch.  Ourran, 
Grattan,  and  Bushe,  were  the  best  talkers  I  had  ever  wit- 
nessed. The  first  (and  I  heard  a  person  make  the  same 
remark  in  London)  was  certainly  the  most  eloquent  man 
whose  conversation  I  ever  had  an  opportunity  of  enjoying. 
But  his  serious  reflections  bore  the  character  of  harangue,  and 
his  wit,  with  all  its  brilliancy,  verged  a  little  upon  farce.  He 
was  so  fond,  indeed,  of  introducing  dialogue  into  his  stories, 
that  at  times  his  conversation  assumed  the  aspect  of  a  dra- 
matic exhibition.  There  was,  perhaps,  too  much  tension  of 
the  intellect  in  those  masterpieces  of  mirth  and  pathos,  in 
which  he  appeared  to  be  under  the  alternate  influence  of 
Momus  and  of  Apollo.  The  conversation  of  Mr.  Grattan  was 
not  of  an  after-dinner  cast.  You  should  have  walked  with 
him  among  the  woods  of  Tinnahinch,  and  listened  to  his  recol- 

emphatically,  the  great  English  statesman  of  his  time.  Amid  the  al  sorbing 
cares  of  public  life,  he  was  the  patron  and  friend  of  art,  literature,  and  science 
and  those  who  devote  their  minds  to  these  ennobling  pursuits. —  M. 


BEOtTGHAM^S    DTNNER-PARTY.  217 

lections  of  a  better  day  by  the  sound  of  the  lulling  and  roman- 
tic waters  of  those  enchanting  groves,  in  which,  it  is  said,  he 
studied  the  arts  of  elocution  in  his  youth,  and  through  which 
he  delighted  to.  wander  in  the  illuminated  sunset  of  his  glo- 
rious age.  It  was  necessary  that  his  faculties  should  be 
thrown  into  a  swing  before  they  should  come  into  full  play. 
He  poured  out  fine  sentiments  in 'glittering  epigrams.  His 
mind  became  antithetical  from  continued  habit,  but  it  was 
necessary  that  it  should  be  thrown  into  excitement  to  bring  it 
into  action.  It  was  in  sketches  of  character  that  he  excelled  ; 
but  yoir  should  give  him  time  and  leisure  for  the  completion 

of  his  miniatures.     Bushe But  I  am  deviating  from 

my  theme. 

To  return  to  Mr.  Brougham,  he  is,  perhaps,  more  negligent 
and  heedless  of  what  he  says  than  any  of  these  eminent  per- 
sons to  whom  I  have  alluded,  and  flings  his  opinions  into 
phrase  without  caring  into  what  shape  they  may  be  moulded. 
I  remember  to  have  read  an  article  in  the  Edinburgh  RevieAV, 
upon  Ourran's  life,  that  eminent  men  in  Hngland  never  make 
any  effort  to  shine  in  conversation ;  and  I  saAv  an  illustration 
of  the  remark  at  Mr.  Brougham's  table.  He  did  not  tell  a 
single  story  —  except,  indeed,  that  he  mentioned  a  practical 
joke  which  had  been  played  upon  Joseph  Hume,*  who 
takes  things  "  au  pic  de  la  lettre"  by  passing  some  strange, 
uncouth  person  upon  him  as  Mr.  O'Oonnell.  The  latter  sat 
between  the  Dukes  of  Devonshire!  and  Leinster.     It  was  the 

Joseph  Hume,  born  in  Scotland  in  1777,  obtained  a  large  fortune  by  con- 
tracts in  India,  during  the  Mahratta  war.  He  returned  in  1808,  and  entered 
Parliament  in  1812.  With  slight  intermission,  he  has  been  in  the  Commons 
ever  since,  and,  from  his  superior  length  of  service  as  a  member,  is  now  enti- 
tled to  the  Nestorian  title  of"  Father  of  the  House."  Mr.  Hume's  great  merit 
is  that  he  applied  himself,  session  after  session,  to  correct  the  extravagant 
expenditure  of  successive  Governments.  At  first,  he  was  a  Tory,  but,  for  tbe 
last  five-and-thirty  years,  has  been  a  Liberal  —  so  much  so,  indeed,  that,  on  one 
occasion,  he  stated  in  Parliament  that  "  he  would  vote  that  black  was  white, 
if  it  would  serve  his  party!'*  As  a  speaker,  Mr.  Hume  is  much  below  par;  as 
a  man  of  business,  industrious  and  good  tempered,  he  has  no  superior. —  M. 

t  The  Duke  of  Devonshire,  one  of  the  wealthiest  peers  in  England,  has  very 
large  estates  in  the  South  of  Ireland,  which  are  let  at  low  rents,  and  well  ad- 
ministered.    He  is  b  ow  in  his  sixty-fourth  year,  and  has  retired  from  public 

Voi,  II.  — 10 


l21S  THE   CATHOLIC   DEPtTTATlON". 

place  of  honor,  and  the  learned  gentleman  filled  it  without 
airs  or  affectation.  In  all  his  intercourse  with  the  great  in 
London,  I  remarked  that  he  comported  himself  in  a  manner 
perfectly  becoming  his  character  and  station  in  his  own  coun- 
try. I  was  glad  to  find  that,  unlike  Sir  Pertinax,  "he  could 
stand  straight  in  the  presence  of  a  great  man."  The  atten- 
tion of  the  company  was  very  much  fixed  upon  him.  Bat  he 
spoke  little.  I  remember  Mr.  Moore  telling  me  an  anecdote 
of  Mrs.  Siddons,  which  is  not  un illustrative  of  the  scene.  A 
large  party  were  invited  to  meet  her.  She  remained  silent,  as 
is  her  wont,  and  disappointed  the  expectations  of  the  whole 
company,  who  watched  for  every  syllable  that  should  escape 
her  lips.  At  length,  however,  being  asked  if  she  would  have 
some  Burton  ale,  she  replied,  with  a  sepulchral  intonation,  that 
"  she  liked  ale  vastly."*  To  this  interesting  remark  the  dis- 
play of  her  intellectual  powers  was  confined.  I  do  not  think 
that  Mr.  O'Oonnell,  upon  this  occasion,  gave  utterance  to  any 
more  profound  or  sagacious  observation. 

Nearly  opposite  to  him  sat  Sir  Francis  Burdett  and  Mr. 
Lambton.f     The  latter  seemed  to  me  to  watch  Mr.  O'ConnelJ 

life  —  which  he  never  cared  for.  He  was  spoken  of,  repeatedly,  as  being  about 
to  accept  the  office  of  Lord  Lieutenant  of  Ireland,  but  the  only  public  situation 
in  which  he  appeared,  was  that  of  Ambassador  to  Russia,  in  1826,  at  the  cor- 
onation of  the  Emperor  Nicholas.  He  is  a  well-known  patron  of  the  fine  arts 
and  his  collection  of  sculpture,  paintings,  and  books,  at  one  of  his  seats  (Chats- 
worth,  in  Derbyshire),  is  world-famed.  He  strongly  advocated  Catholic  Eman- 
cipation.—  M. 

■*  I  remember  mentioning  this  anecdote  to  the  late  Mr.  Maturin,  who  said 
"  The  voice  of  Mrs.  Siddons,  like  St.  Paul's  bell,  should  never  toll  except  for 
the  death  of  kings."  [Lockhart's  Life  of  Scott  records  an  instance  of  this,  at 
the  table  of  the  Ariosto  of  the  North,  where  Mrs.  Siddons,  in  an  eminently 
tragic  voice,  thus  addressed  a  servant:  "I  asked  for  water,  boy  —  you've 
brought  me  beer." — M.] 

t  John  George  Lambton,  born  April,  1792,  entered  Parliament  early,  and 
always  opposed  the  Tory  party.  Lord  Grey  was  his  father-in-law,  but  Lamb- 
ton  did  not  follow  that  haughty  aristocrat's  example  as  regards  Canning,  whose 
Ministry  he  supported.  In  1828,  he  was  created  Baron  Durham.  In  1830, 
he  became  a  member  of  Lord  Grey's  Ministry,  and  was  understood  to  have 
proposed  a  much  larger  measure  of  Parliamentary  Reform  than  Lord  Grey 
would  sanction.  Lord  Durham  became  leader  of  the  movement  party,  and  his 
assumption  of  the  office  of  Premier  was  considered  at  hand.     But  Lord  Grey 


DUKE    OF   SUSSEX.  219 

with  a  very  unremitting  vigilance.  He  hardly  spoke  himself. 
His  air  is  foreign  ;  he  is  full  of  intelligence,  and  looks  like  a 
picture,  by  Murillo,  of  a  young  Spanish  Jesuit  who  has  just 
completed  his  novitiate.  At  the  other  end  of  the  table  sat  the 
celebrated  Mr.  Scarlett*  who  is  at  English  nisi-prius  facile 
■princeps.  I  thought  I  could  perceive  the  wile  of  a  lawyer  in 
his  watchful  and  searching  eye  — 

"  He  is  a  great  observer,  and  he  looks 
Quite  through  the  thoughts  of  men." 

His  smile,  too,  was  perhaps  a  little  like  that  of  Oassius.  He 
said  little  —  altogether,  there  was  not  as  much  alertness  in  the 
dialogue  as  in  the  champagne. 

The  Duke  of  Sussex  seemed  to  me  the  only  person  who 
exhibited  much  hilarity  of  spirit.  There  is  a  good  deal  of 
buoyancy  in  the  temperament  of  his  Royal  Highness.  He 
speaks  with  great  correctness  and  fluency ;  is  perfectly  kind 
and  affable ;  and  laughs  with  all  his  heart  at  his  friend's  jokes 
as  well  as  at  his  own.  If  the  Duke  of  Sussex  were  our  Lord 
Lieutenant  (as  I  hope  he  yet  may  be),  he  would  put  us  into  good 
humor  with  each  other  in  a  month.f     I  would  substitute  Ober- 

quitted  office  in  1834,  and,  in  the  year  after  (to  get  him  out  of  the  way?)  Lord 
Durham  was  sent  to  Russia  as  Ambassador,  where  he  remained  for  two  years. 
In  1838,  he  was  sent  to  Canada,  as  Governor-General,  with  almost  dictatorial 
powers,  in  the  use  of  which  he  was  not  supported  by  the  Melbourne  Ministry 
in  England,  whereupon  he  returned  home,  the  same  year.  He  died,  July, 
1840.  In  debate  he  was  a  good  speaker,  but  an  air  of  hauteur  dulled  the 
effects  of  his  most  impassioned  language. —  M. 

*  Sir  James  Scarlett,  then  a  whig,  but  afterward  Attorney-General  under 
the  Wellington  Administration.  He  eventually  became  Lord  Abinger,  and 
Chief  Baron  of  the  Exchequer. —  M. 

t  Augustus  Frederick,  Duke  of  Sussex,  was  sixth  son  of  George  III.,  and 
much  offended  his  father  by  contracting  marriage,  when  a  minor,  with  Lady 
Augusta  Murray,  daughter  of  a  Scottish  Earl.  (One  of  the  newspapers  of  tbe 
day  stated,  that  "  Lady  Augusta  soon  became  pregnant,  and  returned  to  Eng- 
land ;  the  Duke  of  Sussex  did  the  same")  This  union,  which  took  place  in 
Italy,  was  confirmed,  on  their  return  to  England,  and  two  children  were  "  the 
consekence  of  that  manoover,"  to  use  the  classic  words  of  the  elder  Mr.  Weller. 
One  of  these  was  the  late  Sir  Augustus  d'Este,  who  unsuccessfully  sought  the 
Dukedom  on  bis  father's  death,  the  other  (who,  when  I  first  saw  her,  in  1828, 
was  one  of  the  finest  women  in  England)  was  Mademoiselle  d'Este,  who,  in 
middle  age,  married  Sir  Thprn^a  Wilde,  created  Lord  Truro  and  Chancellor  of 


220  THE  CATHOLIC  DEPUTATION. 

oil's  whistle  for  Alecto's  horn*  I  should  like  to  hear  the  hon- 
est and  cordial  langh  of  the  Duke  of  Sussex  at  tin  aggregate 
levee  of  Catholics  and  Protestants  at  the  Castle.  I  should 
like  to  hear  the  echoes  of  St.  Patrick's  Hall,t  taking  up  the 
1-03- al  mirth  in  a  long  and  loud  reverberation.  What  might, 
peradventure,  he  an  excess  of  vivacity  in  a  gentleman,  would 
be  condescending  pleasantry  in  a  prince. 

I  understood,  at  Mr.  Brougham's,  that  it  was  intended  to 
give  a  public  dinner  to  the  Catholic  deputies,  at  which  the 
leading  advocates  of  Emancipation  were  to  be  present.  Much 
preparation  was  made  for  this  festival  of  liberality,  but  it  was 
afterward  conceived  that  it  would  be  more  judicious  upon  the 
part  of  the  friends  of  religious  liberty  not  to  provoke  their  an- 
tagonists into  a  reaction,  which  it  was  thought  likely  might  be 
produced.  The  idea  was  abandoned  ;  but,  in  order  to  give  the 
deputies  an  opportunity  of  expressing  their  sentiments  in  pub- 
lic, the  British  Catholics  held  a  general  meeting  at  the  Free- 
masons' Hall. 

The  Duke  of  Norfolk  was  in  the  chair  .J!     The  assembly  was 

England  in  1850. —  The  Prince's  marriage  was  dissolved  by  the  Prerogative 
Court,  and  the  union  accordingly  ended  in  separation.  At  the  age  of 
twenty-eight,  Prince  Augustus  was  created  Duke  of  Sussex,  with  an  allowance 
of  twelve  thousand  pounds  sterling  a  year,  afterward  raised  to  twenty  thousand 
pounds  sterling  a  year  —  which  he  always  complained  was  too  small  !  He  sided 
with  the  Whig  party  —  as  much  as  a  Prince  could.  He  laid  himself  out  for  pop- 
ularity, and,  at  public  dinners  and  charitable  meetings,  was  liberal  in  giving  — 
his  speeches.  He  had  a  fine  library,  and  had  accumulated  a  magnificent  col- 
lection of  Bibles,  in  various  languages  and  of  various  editions.  Some  time 
before  his  death,  he  wedded  the  rich  widow  of  a  city  knight,  bearing  the  illus- 
trious name  of — Buggins  !  She  has  since  been  created  Duchess  of  Inverness. 
Born  January,  1773,  the  Duke  of  Sussex  died  April,  1843,  aged  seventy.  Hia 
pompous  manner  would  have  disgusted  the  Irish  in  a  week,  if  he  had  been 
sent  to  Dublin  as  their  Viceroy. —  M. 

*  In  Wieland's  Oberon,  at  the  sound  of  a  magic  whistle,  laughter  is  instanta- 
neously produced;  a  merriment  takes  the  place  of  strife. 

t  A  spacious  apartment  in  Dublin  Castle,  in  which  Royalty  (personally  or  by 
proxy)  holds  levels  and  drawing-rooms,  and  where  the  Installation  of  Knights 
of  St.  Patrick  generally  takes  place. —  M. 

t  The  Duke  of  Norfolk,  in  1825,  was  a  stout,  red-faced  gentleman,  looking 
very  like  a  London  Alderman,  accustomed  to  civic  banquets.  He  was  as  plain 
in  his  manners  as  in  his  appearance.     Indeed,  it  was  reported  that  he  had  been 


FKEEMASONS'-HALL    MEETING.  221 

not  as  numerous  as  I  had  expected  —  it  was  in  a  great  measure 
composed  of  Irish.  Many  persons  were  deterred  from  attend- 
ing by  the  title  of  the  meeting,  which  seemed  to  confine  it  to 
Roman  Catholics.  In  consequence  of  the  impression  that  Prot- 
estants were  not  invited  to  assist  in  these  proceedings,  few  of 
the  Parliamentary  supporters  of  Emancipation  attended.  Mr. 
Coke,  of  Norfolk,  who  sat  next  to  the  chairman,  was  almost  the 
only  English  Protestant  of  distinction  whom  I  observed  at  the 
meeting.*  I  believe,  however,  that  an  anxiety  to  hear  Mr. 
O'Connell,  induced  a  great  number  of  the  literary  men  attached 
to  the  periodical  and  daily  press  to  attend. 

Mr.  O'Connell  appeared  to  me  extremely  solicitous  about  the 
impression  which  he  should  produce,  and  prepared  and  arranged 
his  topics  with  unusual  care.  In  public  meetings  in  Ireland, 
he  is  so  confident  in  his  powers,  that  he  gives  himself  little 
trouble  in  the  selection  of  his  materials,  and  generally  trusts 
to  his  emotions  for  his  harangues.f     He  is,  on  that  account,  oc- 

known  as  "  Mr.  Howard,"  a  wine-merchant/in  one  of  the  streets  off  the  Strand, 
in  London,  before  the  death  of  "  the  dirty  Duke,"  without  legitimate  male 
issue,  drove  "  all  the  blood  of  all  the  Howards"  up  to  fever-heat,  in  expectation 
of  turning  out  next  of  kin.  The  Duke,  with  the  uncleanly  soubriquet,  had 
turned  Protestant,  in  order  to  sit  in  Parliament.  The  present  Duke  has  also 
abjured  the  faith  of  his  ancestors.  The  "  dirty  Duke"  never  underwent  volun- 
tary ablution,  but,  once  or  twice  a  week,  when  dead-drunk,  was  stripped,  laid 
upon  a  table,  soaped,  scrubbed,  and  towelled,  into  a  state  of  comparative  clean- 
liness.—  The  Dukedom,  conferred  in  1483,  is  the  oldest  in  England,  and  its 
owner  is  therefore  Premier  Duke.  He  is  also  Hereditary  Earl-Marshal,  and, 
as  such,  has  the  regulation  of  the  coronation  ceremonies,  and  attests  the  signa- 
ture of  the  Sovereign  to  the  documents  wherein  Peers,  Peeresses,  Privy  Coun- 
.cillors,  and  others,  are  invited  to  participate  in  the  pageant.  —  M. 

*  Thomas  William  Coke,  of  Holkham,  in  the  county  of  Norfolk,  was  a  de- 
scendant of  Sir  Edward  Coke,  the  great  lawyer,  and  will  be  chiefly  remembered 
for  the  extent  and  success  of  his  improvements  in  English  agriculture,  by  which 
he  raised  the  value  of  his  estates  from  two  thousand  to  twenty  thousand  pounds 
sterling  a  year.  He  was  of  the  extreme  liberal -party,  from  whom  he  presented 
so  many  remonstrant  addresses  to  George  III.,  that  his  Majesty  jocosely  said, 
"  Coke,  if  you  bring  me  another  of  these,  I'll  certainly  knight  you"  —  a  severe 
threat  to  a  man  who  prided  himself  on  his  old  family,  had  declined  a  baronetcy 
as  too  low,  and  claimed  a  dormant  earldom.  His  friends  the  Whigs,  with 
whom  he  had  always  voted,  created  him  Earl  of  Leicester  in  1837,  when  he 
was  eighty-five  years  old.     He  died  in  June,  1842,  aged  ninety.  —  M. 

t  The  character  of  O'Connell's  eloquence  has  never  been  clearly  indicated. 


222  THE  CATHOLIC  DEPUTATION. 

casionally  desultory  and  irregular.  But  there  is  no  man  more 
capable  of  lucid  exposition,  when  he  previously  deliberates 
upon  the  order  in  which  he  should  array  the  topics  upon  which 
he  intends  to  dwell.  He  undertook,  on  this  occasion,  the  very 
laborious  task  of  tracing  the  progress  of  the  penal  code,  and 
epitomized  in  some  measure  the  history  of  his  country.  For 
the  first  hour  he  was,  perhaps,  a  little  encumbered  with  small  de- 
tails ;  but  when  he  advanced  into  the  general  consideration  of 
the  grievances  under  which  the  great  body  of  the  people  are 
doomed  to  labor  —  when  he  painted  the  insolence  of  the  domi- 
nant faction  —  when  he  showed  the  effects  of  the  penal  code 
brought  to  his  own  door  —  he  seized  with  an  absolute  dominion 
upon  the  sympathies  of  his  acclaiming  auditors,  and  poured  the 
full  tide  of  his  own  emotions  into  their  hearts.  I  did  not  greatly 
heed  the  results  of  Mr.  O'Connell's  oratory  upon  the  great  bulk 
of  his  audience.  Many  a  big  drop,  compounded  of  heat  and 
patriotism,  of  tears  and  of  perspiration,  stood  upon  the  rude  and 
honest  faces  that  were  cast  in  true  Hibernian  mould,  and  were 
raised  toward  the  glory  of  Ireland  with  a  mixed  expression  of 
wonder  and  of  love.  I  was  far  more  anxious  to  detect  the  feel- 
ing produced  upon  the  literary  and  English  portion  of  the  au- 
dience.    It  was  most  favorable. 

Mr.  Charles  Butler,  near  whom  I  happened  to  sit,  and  whom 

Its  leading  feature  was  intense  earnestness.  Whatever  his  style,  and  it  would 
vary  a  dozen  times  in  the  same  speech,  he  always  had  a  purpose.  He  was  not 
a  man  to  string  words  together  into  pretty  sentences,  as  women  string  beads  of 
coral,  but  he  spoke  with  a  will  and  with  an  aim.  His  Irish  auditors  expected 
to  be  amused  as  well  as  roused,  and  O'Connell  entertained  as  well  as  excited 
them.  He  had  dropped  his  plummet  into  the  Irish  heart,  and  sounded  its  re- 
motest depths.  He  has  been  compared,  at  various  times,  to  the  great  orators 
whom  Ireland  has  produced;  but  he  resembled  none  of  them  singly.  He  had 
less  imagination  than  Curran,  less  philosophy  than  Burke,  less  wit  than  Can- 
ning, less  rhetoric  than  Sheil,  less  classicahty  than  Bushe,  less  eloquence  than 
Plunket,  less  pathos  than  Grattan  ;  but  he  had  more  power  than  any  of  them. 
His  la:  guage  was  forcible,  even  when  he  was  most  playful.  And,  when  ad- 
dresrirg-  an  Irish  audience,  he  applied  himself  to  charm  them,  there  was  such 
an  alte -nation  of  style  —  now  soaring  to  the  loftiest,  and  now  subsiding  to  the 
most  fi  miliar  —  that  he  carried  all  hearts  with  him,  until  the  listeners  seemed 
unde'.  i he  spell  of  an  enchanter,  moved  to  anger  or  to  mirth  even  as  he  might 
desire      This  was  to  be  indeed  a  g-3it  orator,  and  this  was  O'Connell.  —  M. 


MR.  sheil's  speech.  223 

I  should  he  disposed  to  account  a  severe  hut  excellent  critic, 
was  greatly  struck.  He  several  times  expressed  his  admira- 
tion of  the  powers  of  the  speaker.  The  applause  of  such  a  man 
is  worth  that  of  a  "  whole  theatre  of  others."  Mr.  Coke,  also, 
whose  judgment  is,  I  understand,  held  in  very  great  estima- 
tion, and  who  has  witnessed  the  nohlest  displays  of  Parliament- 
ary eloquence,  intimated  an  equally  high  opinion.  Immedi- 
ately under  Mr.  O'Connell  there  was  an  array,  and  a  very  for- 
midable one,  of  the  delegates  from  the  press.  They  appeared 
to  me  to  survey  Mr.  O'Connell  with  a  good  deal  of  supercilious 
distaste  at  the  opening  of  his  speech  ;  and,  although  some 
among  them  persevered  to  the  last  in  their  intimations  of  na- 
tional disrelish,  and  shrugged  their  shoulders  at  "Irish  elo- 
quence," the  majority  surrendered  their  prejudices  to  their 
good  feelings,  and  ultimately  concurred  in  the  loud  plaudits 
v/ith  which  Mr.  O'Connell  concluded  his  oration.  It  occupied 
nearly  three  hours  and  a  half. 

Mr.  O'Hanlon  succeeded  Mr.  O'Connell.  He  spoke  well, 
but  the  auditory  were  exhausted,  and  began  to  break  up.  Less 
attention  was  paid  to  Mr.  O'Hanlon  than  he  would  have  re- 
ceived at  a  more  opportune  moment.  The  excitation  produced 
by  Mr.  O'Connell,  the  lateness  of  the  hour,  and  the  recollec- 
tions of  dinner,  were  potent  impediments  to  rhetorical  effect. 

Mr.  Sheil  rose  under  similar  disadvantages.  He  cast  that 
sort  of  look  about  him  which  I  have  witnessed  in  an  actor  when 
he  surveys  an  empty  house.  The  echo  produced  by  the  dimi- 
nution of  the  crowd  drowned  his  voice,  which,  being  naturally 
of  a  harsh  quality,  requires  great  management,  and,  in  order  to 
produce  any  oratorical  impression,  must  be  kept  under  the  control 
of  art.  Mr.  Sheil  became  disheartened,  and  lost  his  command 
over  his  throat.  He  grew  loud  and  indistinct.  He  also  fell  into 
the  mistake  of  laying  aside  his  habitual  cast  of  expression  and 
of  thought,  and,  in  place  of  endeavoring  to  excite  the  feelings 
of  his  auditory,  wearied  them  with  a  laborious  detail  of  unin- 
teresting facts.  He  failed  to  produce  any  considerable  impres- 
sion excepting  at  the  close  of  his  speech,  in  which,  after  dwel- 
ling upon  the  great  actions  which  were  achieved  by  the  Catho- 
lic ancestors  of  some  of  the  eminent  men  around  him,  he  intro- 


224  THE    CATHOLIC    DEPUTATION. 

duced  Jean  of  Arc  prophesying  to  Talbot  the  observation  of 
his  illustrious  name,  and  the  exclusion  of  his  posterity  from  the 
councils  of  his  country.* 

I  should  not  omit  to  mention  the  speech  delivered  by  Lord 
Stourton  at  this  meeting.  It  was  easy  to  collect  from  his  man- 
ner that  he  was  not  in  the  habit  of  addressing  a  large  assem- 
bly, but  the  sentiments  to  which  he  gave  utterance  were  high 
and  manly,  and  becoming  a  British  nobleman  who  had  been 
spoliated  of  his  rights.  His  language  was  not  only  elegant 
and  refined,  but  adorned  with  imagery  of  an  original  cast,  de- 
rived from  those  sciences  with  which  his  Lordship  is  said  to 
be  familiar.f  Some  of  the  deputies  dined  with  him  after  the 
meeting.     They  were  sumptuously  entertained. 

I  had  now  become  more  habituated  to  the  display  of  patri- 
cian magnificence  in  England,  and  saw  the  exhibition  of  its 
splendor  without  surprise.  Yet  I  confess  that  at  Norfolk- house, 
where  the  Duke  did  Mr.  O'Connell,  Lord  Killeen,  and  others 
of  our  deputation,  the  honor  to  invite  them,  and,  in  compliment 
to  our  cause,  brought  together  an  assemblage  of  men  of  the 
highest  rank  and  genius  in  England,  I  was  dazzled  with  the 
splendor  and  gorgeousness  of  an  entertainment  to  which  I  had 
seen  no  parallel.  Norfolk-house  is  one  of  the  finest  in  London. 
The  interior,  which  is  in  the  style  prevalent  about  eighty  years 
ago  in  England,  realizes  the  notions  which  one  forms  of  a  pal- 
ace. It  was  indeed  occupied  at  one  time  by  some  members  of 
the  royal  family  ;  and  the  Duke  told  us  that  the  late  King 
[George  III.]  was  born  in  the  room  in  which  we  dined.  We 
passed  through  a  series  of  magnificent  apartments,  rich  with 
crimson  and  fretted  with  gold.  There  was  no  glare  of  exces- 
sive light  in  this  vast  and  seemingly  endless  mansion;  and  the 
massive  lamps  which  were  suspended  from  the  embossed  and 
gilded  ceilings,  diffused  a  shadowed  illumination,  and  left  the 

*  Mr.  Sheil,  whose  speech  at  this  meeting  was  a  failure  —  the  patience  of 
his  audience  having  been  exhausted  before  he  rose  —  adroitly  attempts  here  to 
explain  away  the  fact.  From  some  cause  or  other,  his  voice,  naturally  shrill, 
almost  wholly  failed  him,  and  his  auditors  were  greatly  disappointed.  —  M. 

\  The  Lord  Stourton  here  mentioned  was  the  seventeenth  Baron  of  that  name; 
the  peerage  bearing  date  1448.     The  family  is  Catholic.  —  M. 


THE   DUKE   OF   NORFOLK.  225 

distance  in  the  dusk.  The  transition  to  the  great  chamber 
where  the  company  were  assembled,  and  which  was  glowing 
with  light,  presented  a  brilliant  and  imposing  contrast.  Here 
we  found  the  Duke  of  Norfolk,  surrounded  by  persons  of  high 
distinction.  Among  the  company  were  the  Dukes  of  Sussex, 
Devonshire,  and  Leinster,  Lord  Grey,  Lord  Fitzwilliam,  Lord 
Shrewsbury,  Lord  Donoughmore,  Lord  Stourton,  Lord  Clifford, 
Lord  Nugent,  Lord  Arundel,  Sir  Francis  Burdett,  Mr.  Butler, 
Mr.  Abercrombie,  Mr.  Blunt,  Mr.  Denman,  and  other  persons  of 
eminence  and  fame.* 

The  Duke  of  Norfolk  came  forward  to  meet  us,  and  gave  us 
a  cordial  and  cheerful  welcome.  This  amiable  nobleman  is 
distinguished  by  the  kindness  and  goodness  of  his  manners, 
which  bespeak  an  excellent  and  unassuming  spirit,  and  through 
all  the  political  intercourse  which  we  had  with  him  the  great 
question,  in  which  he  feels  so  deep  an  interest,  manifested  a 
shrewd  sound  sense,  and  a  high  and  intense  anxiety  for  the 
success  of  the  great  cause  of  religious  liberty,  from  which  very 
beneficial  results  have  already  ensued.  He  has  been  very 
instrumental  in  effecting  a  junction  between  the  English  and 
Irish  Roman  Catholics,  and  has  thus  conferred  a  great  service 
upon  both.  We  were  received  by  him  with  the  most  gracious 
and  unaffected  urbanity. 

I  was  struck  with  the  perfect  freedom  from  authoritativeness 
which  characterized  most  of  the  eminent  men  who  were  placed 
about  me.     There  is  among  the  petty  aristocracy  of  Ireland 

*  Of  these,  Lords  Grey,  Shrewsbury,  Donoughmore,  Clifford,  Arundel,  Mr. 
Butler,  and  Mr.  Blunt,  have  departed  this  life.  Mr.  Abercrombie,  then  a  very 
obscure  man  (who  worked  himself  up,  from  being  the  Duke  of  Devonshire's 
steward), used  his  employer's  interest  to  get  him  made  Chief  Baron  of  the  Ex- 
chequer in  Scotland,  at  four  thousand  pounds  sterling  a  year.  It  was  so  much 
a  sinecure,  that,  in  the  thirty  months  he  held  it,  he  only  tried  four  cases,  thus 
receiving  ten  thousand  pounds  for  doing  nothing.  The  sinecure  was  abolished, 
and  Abercrombie  was  compensated  by  a  pension  of  two  thousand  pounds,  which 
was  suspended  when  he  was  made  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Commons  in  1837 
(salary  six  thousand  pounds  a  yeai',  and  one  thousand  pounds  more  for  a  house), 
and,  after  two  years'  service,  retired  on  a  pension  of  four  thousand  pounds  for 
his  own  life  and  that  of  his  son,  and  a  peerage  as  Baron  Dumferliae.  What 
renders  this  more  strange  is,  that  this  man  had  boorish  manners,  no  learning,  no 
eloquence,  nothing  but  the  Duke  of  Devonshire's  patronage  to  push  him  on.  -    M- 

10* 


226  THE    CATHOLIC    DEPUTATION. 

infinitely  more  arrogance  of  port  and  look  than  I  observed 
among  the  first  men  of  the  British  empire.  Certain  of  out 
colonial  aristocracy  are  far  more  bloated  and  full-blown  with  a 
notion  of  their  own  importance.  The  reason  is  obvious.  The 
former  rest  in  security  upon  their  unquestionable  title  to  re- 
spect. Their  dignity  fits  them  like  an  accustomed  garment. 
But  men  who  are  raised  but  to  a  small  elevation,  on  which 
they  hold  a  dubious  ground,  feel  it  necessary  to  impress  their 
consequence  upon  others  by  an  assumption  of  superiority  which 
is  always  offensive,  and  generally  absurd.  Lord  Fitzwilliam 
was  the  person  with  whom  I  was  disposed  to  be  most  pleased. 
This  venerable  nobleman  carries,  with  a  gray  head,  a  young 
and  fresh  heart.  He  may  be  called  the  old  Adam  of  the 
political  world  ;  and  England  might  well  exclaim  to  her  faith- 
ful servant,  in  the  language  of  Orlando  — 

"  Oh,  good  old  man,  how  well  in  thee  appears 
The  constant  service  of  the  antique  world! 
Thou  art  not  for  the  fashion  of  these  times, 
When  none  will  sweat  but  for  promotion." 

It  is  impossible  to  look  upon  this  amiable  and  dignified 
patrician  of  the  olden  stamp,  without  a  feeling  of  affectionate 
admiration  for  his  pure  and  distinguished  patriotism  and  the 
warm  love  of  his  country,  which  lives  (if  I  may  so  say)  under 
the  ashes  of  age,  and  requires  but  to  be  stirred  to  emit  the 
flashes  of  its  former  fire.  The  natural  apathy  incidental  to  his 
time  of  life,  appears  habitually  to  prevail  over  him  ;  but  speak 
to  him  of  the  great  interests  of  the  empire  —  speak  to  him  of 
that  measure  which  at  an  earlier  period  he  was  delegated 
by  his  sovereign  to  complete  —  speak  to  him  of  Ireland,  and 
through  the  dimness  that  loads  his  eye,  a  sudden  illumination 
will  break  forth.  For  Ireland  he  entertains  a  kind  of  pa- 
ternal tenderness.  He  reverted  with  a  Nestorian  pride  to 
the  period  of  his  own  government;  and  mentioned  that  he 
had  preserved  the  addresses  which  he  had  received  from 
the  Roman  Catholic  body  as  among  the  best  memorials  of 
his  political  life.  That  he  should  live  long  enough  to  see 
the  emancipation  of  the  Irish  people,  seemed  to  be  the  wish 
nearest  to  his  heart     It  does  one  good  — it  is  useful  in  a  mora* 


LO&D   GftEY.  22? 

point  of  view,  to  approach  such  a  person  as  Lord  Fitzwilliam, 
and  to  feel  that  there  is  in  public  men  such  a  thing  as  a  pure 
and  disinterested  anxiety  for  the  benefit  of  mankind,  and  that 
the  vows  of  all  politicians  are  not,  whatever  we  may  be  disposed 
to  think,  "  as  false  as  dicers'  oaths." 

In  describing  the  impression  produced  upon  me  by  Lord 
Fitzwilliam,  I  have  mentioned  the  result  of  my  observation  at 
Mr.  Ponsonby's,  where  the  deputies  afterward  met  him,  as  well 
as  at  Norfolk  house.  Lord  Grey  also  dined  at  Mr.  Ponsonby's, 
where  I  had  a  better  opportunity  of  noting  him.*     He  is  some- 

*  Charles,  Earl  Grey,  bora  in  1764,  was  M.  P.  for  his  native  county  of 
Northumberland,  almost  as  soon  as  he  attained  his  majority.  He  soon  display- 
ed ability,  as  a  debater  on  the  liberal  side,  and  was  associated  with  Burke, 
Sheridan,  and  others,  as  one  of  the  managers  of  the  impeachment  of  Warren 
Hastings.  He  went  beyond  Fox  in  his  democratical  opinions.  On  Pitt's  death, 
in  1806,  when  "  All  the  Talents"  formed  a  Cabinet,  of  which  Fox  was  the  ac- 
tual, while  the  Duke  of  Portland  was  the  nominal  head,  Mr.  Grey  (who  now 
bore  the- honorary  title  of  Viscount  Howick,  his  father  having  been  made  Earl 
Grey  in  1802)  took  office  as  First  Lord  of  the  Admiralty.  In  October,  1806, 
Lord  Howick  succeeded  Fox  as  Foreign  Secretary,  but  the  Ministry  soon 
broke  up,  and,  on  the  death  of  his  father  in  1807,  he  went  to  the  Upper  House, 
as  Earl  Grey,  and  warmly  defended  Queen  Caroline  in  1820.  He  remained 
out  of  office  until  November  1830,  but  on  two  or  three  occasions,  when  a  Coa- 
lition ministry  was  talked  of,  there  were  negotiations  (always  ending  in  failure) 
to  bring  in  Lord  Grey.  His  personal  pride  intervened  —  as  he  wanted  first 
place,  or  none.  This,  no  doubt,  made  him  strongly  oppose  Canning's  Ministry, 
in  1827  —  it  was  "most  tolerable  and  not  to  be  endured"  that  a  mere  common- 
er should  be  Prims  Minister,  while  Earl  Grey  was  ready  and  anxious  for  the 
office  !  At  last,  in  1830,  he  obtained  the  prize  —  because  Parliamentary  Reform 
was  needed,  and,  as  Mr.  Grey,  he  had  suggested  a  plan  some  five-and-thirty 
years  before.  After  a  great  struggle,  Reform  was  granted  —  more  than  Grey 
actually  thought  prudent  to  bestow  (having  such  a  horror  of  democratic  in- 
roads tbat  he  once  publicly  declared  that  "  he  would  stand  by  his  order")  but 
less  than  his  son-in-law,  Lord  Durham,  thought  was  wise  and  just.  In  July, 
1834,  he  resigned  office,  and  took  no  further  part  in  politics.  He  died,  July, 
1845,  aged  eighty-one.  As  Minister  of  the  Crown,  he  had  one  overpowering 
fault,  which  Peel  was  eminently  free  from  —  that  of  nepotism.  It  really  appeared 
as  if  the  object  of  his  taking  office  was  to  provide  for  his  family,  his  connections, 
for  every  one  named  Grey.  For  this  he  was  constantly  baited  by  Cobbett,  who 
published  what  he  called  "  The  Grey  List,"  stating  the  various  offices  to  which 
Grey  had  been  appointed,  giving  the  name  of  each  official,  and  showing  that 
they  were  the. recipients  of  about  one  hundred  and  seventy  thousand  pounds 
Bterling  a  year  —  all,  but   twenty  thousand  pounds  sterling,  being  derived  froai 


228  THE   CATHOLIC   DEPUTATION. 

what  silent  and  reserved.  It  is  the  fashion  among  Tories  to 
account  him  contemptuous  and  haughty  ;  but  I  can  not  coincide 
with  them.  He  has,  indeed,  a  lofty  bearing,  but  it  is  not  at 
all  artificial.  It  is  the  aristocracy  of  virtue  as  well  as  rank. 
There  is  something  uncompromising,  and  perhaps  stern  as 
well  as  inflexible  in  his  aspect.  Tall,  erect,  and  collected  in 
himself,  he  carries  the  evidences  of  moral  and  intellectual 
ascendency  impressed  upon  him,  and  looks  as  if  he  knew  him- 
self to  be,  in  the  proudest  sense  which  the  poet  has  attached 
to  the  character,  not  only  a  great  but  an  honest  man.  And 
why  should  he  not  look  exactly  what  he  is  ?  Why  should  he 
not  wrap  himself  in  the  consciousness  of  his  political  integrity, 
and  seem  to  say,  " mea  virtufe  involvo"  while  so  many  others, 
who  Avere  once  the  companions  of  his  journey,  and  who  turned 
aside  into  a  more  luxuriant  road,  in  taking  a  retrospect,  as  the 
close  of  life  is  drawing  near,  of  the  mazy  course  which  they 
have  trod,  behold  it  winding  through  a  rich  and  champagne 
country,  and  occasionally  deviating  into  low  but  not  unpro- 
ductive declivities?  This  eminent  man,  in  looking  back  from 
the  point  of  moral  elevation  on  which  he  stands,  will  trace  his 
path  in  one  direct  and  unbroken  line  —  through  a  lofty  region 
which  has  been  barren  of  all  but  fame,  and  from  which  no 
allurement  of  ease,  or  of  profusion,  could  ever  induce  him  to 
depart. 

Lord  Grey  has  a  touch  of  sadness  upon  him,  which  would 
look  dissatisfaction  to  a  placeman's  eye;  but  there  is  nothing 
really  morose  or  atrabilious  in  his  expression.  He  has  found 
that  sorrow  can  unbar  the  palaces  of  the  great,  as  well  as 
unlatch  the  cottages  of  the  lowly.  His  dear  friend  and  near 
ally  is  gone  —  his  party  is  almost  broken.*     He  has  survived 

life  appointments  !  The  truth  of  these  accusations  was  undeniable,  and  helped, 
no  doubt,  to  account  for  Lord  Grey's  unpopularity  after  the  Reform  struggle 
was  ended.  He  was  an  eloquent  speaker  —  seldom  warmed  into  passion  o) 
even  into  excitement,  but  fluent,  connect,  and  sometimes  rather  forcible. —  M. 

*  The  allusion  here  appears  to  be  to  Fox,  who,  however,  had  died  nearl) 
nineteen  years  before.  Charles  James  Fox,  born  in  1749,  was  the  second  son 
of  the  first  Lord  Holland,  by  whom  he  was  educated  for  political  life.  At  the 
age  of  nineteen,  two  years  before  the  legal  age,  he  was  elected  member  of  par- 
liament.    From  1770  to  1774,  he  was  an  advocate  of  the  Ministry,  and  wag 


CtfABLTCS    JAMES    FOX.  229 

the  death,  and,  let  me  add,  the  virtue  of  many  illustrious  men, 
and  looks  like  the  lonely  column  of  the  fabric  which  he  sus- 
tained so  nobly,  and  which  has  fallen  at  last  around  him.  It 
is  not  wonderful  that  he  should  seem  to  stand  in  solitary  lofti- 
ness, and  that  melancholy  should  have  given  a  solemn  tinge  to 
his  mind.  He  spoke  of  the  measures  intended  to  he  made 
collateral  to  emancipation,  and  said,t  *  *  *  * 

successively  Lord  of  the  Admiralty  and  of  the  Treasury.  At  the  age  of  24, 
the  Ministry  dismissed  him  —  thereby  converting  a  warm  friend  into  a  bitter 
opponent.  He  resisted  the  American  war,  and  on  Lord  North's  removal,  ob- 
tained a  seat  in  the  Cabinet,  as  Secretary  of  State.  The  Rockingham  Adminis- 
tration breaking  up,  on  the  death  of  its  head,  Lord  Shelburne  became  Premier, 
and  after  some  time,  Fox  coalesced  with  Lord  North  (his  old  antagonist)  ;  a 
measure  which  nearly  ruined  the  popularity  of  both.  Their  India  Bill  led  to 
their  downfall,  and  the  nomination  of  William  Pitt,  in  his  25th  year,  as  Pre- 
mier. Fox  espoused  the  leading  principles  of  the  French  Revolution,  which 
Pitt  contended  against,  and  this  also  led  to  a  total  rupture  with  Burke,  long 
his  friend,  and  to  the  erasure  of  his  name,  by  the  hand  of  the  King  himself 
from  the  Roll  of  the  Privy  Council.  When  Pitt  died,  in  1806,  Loi'd  Grenville 
drew  Fox  from  opposition,  and  made  him  Foreign  Secretary.  He  did  not  long 
hold  office,  for  which  he  had  so  long  contended,  but  died  in  September,  1806. 
The  eloquence  of  Fox  was  vehement  rather  than  polished,  but  it  was  forcible 
and  effective.  In  private  life  he  was  convivial,  witty,  and  genial.  He  was 
somewhat  of  an  historian,  too,  but  spoke  better  than  he  wrote.  He  was  addict- 
ed to  gaming,  and  was  a  man  of  uncalculating  and  almost  boundless  extrava- 
gance. He  was  buried  in  Westminister  Abbey,  close  to  his  great  rival  Pitt. 
Scott  says 

"  Drop  upon  Fox's  tomb  a  tear 
'Twill  trickle  to  his  rival's  bier." 
Fox  was  the  intimate  friend  of  the  Prince  of  Wales,  afterward  George  IV., 
for  many  years,  but  the  intimacy  broke  off  after  the  marriage  of  the  Prince. —  M. 
t  This  article,  published  May,  1825,  broke  off  thus  abruptly,  with  "  (  The 
Conclusion  in  our  next  Number) ,"  holding  out  promise  of  some  more  of  the 
personal  and  political  gossip  which  attracted  much  attention  at  the  time.  The 
"  conclusion"  never  appeared.  Mr.  Sheil  told  me  that,  though  written,  it  was 
suppressed,  at  the  strong  desire  of  the  late  Lord  Grey,  one  of  the  haughtiest 
aristocrats  in  England,  at  the  time,  who  was  alarmed  at  the  idea  of  any  of  his 
table-talk  being  reported !  I  believe  that,  until  now,  the  exact  reason  of  this 
suppression,  though  suspected  at  the  time,  has  not  been  stated  on  authority. —  M 


ARCHIBALD  HAMILTON  ROWAN. 

Of  all  the  remarkable  men  I  have  met,  Hamilton  Rowan,  I 
think,  is  the  one  Avhose  external  appearance  most  completely 
answers  to  the  character  of  his  mind,  and  the  events  of  his 
life.  The  moment  your  eye  has  taken  in  the  whole  of  his  fine 
athletic  configuration,  you  see  at  once  that  nature  designed 
him  to  be  a  great  massive  engine  of  a  popular  cause.  When 
he  entered  life,  he  might  easily  have  taken  his  place  as  a 
leading  member  of  the  aristocracy  of  his  country.  He  had 
high  connections,  a  noble  fortune,  manners  and  accomplish- 
ments that  would  have  graced  a  court  —  but  his  high  and 
adventurous  spirit  could  not  have  brooked  the  sedentary  forms, 
and  still  less  the  despotic  maxims,  of  an  Irish  state-career. 
He  never  could  have  endured  to  sit  at  a  council-board,  with 
his  herculean  limbs  gathered  under  him,  to  deliberate  upon  the 
most  expedient  modes  of  trampling  upon  public  rights.  As  a 
mere  matter  of  animal  propensity,  his  more  natural  vocation 
was  to  take  the  side  of  enterprise  and  danger — to  mingle  in 
the  tumult  of  popular  commotion,  and  leading  on  his  band  of 
citizen-soldiers  "  to  the  portals  of  the  Oastle,  to  call  aloud  in 
their  name  for  the  minister  to  come  forth  and  resist  at  his  peril 
the  national  cry  for  'Universal  Emancipation.'"*  This  was 
his  election,  and  his  conscience  coincided  with  his  impulses. 
He  became,  as  might  be  expected,  the  idol  of  the  populace, 
and,  from  the  qualities  which  made  him  so,  too  formidable  to 
the  state  to  be  tolerated.  He  was  prosecuted  and  convicted, 
by  a  tribunal  of  very  doubtful  purity ,t  of  feeling  too  ardently 
for  the  political  degradation  of  Ireland. 

*  See  his  trial  in  Howell's  State  Trials,  for  1794. 

t  See  the  motion  for  a  new  trial,  and  the  documents  thera  used. —  Howell's 
State  Trials. 


HtS    PKfcSOttAL    APPEARANCE.  231 

Thus  far  Hamilton  Rowan  Lad  acted  upon  the  principles  of 
an  Irish  reformer,  and  if  he  avowed  them  indiscreetly,  or 
pushed  them  too  far,  he  suffered  for  it.  In  his  imprisonment, 
•which  he  at  least  considered  as  oppression,  he  was  provoked  to 
listen  to  more  dangerous  doctrines.  He  committed  himself  in 
conferences  with  a  spy  who  procured  a  ready  access  to  his 
presence;  and  to  avoid  the  consequences,  effected  his  escape 
to  a  foreign  land. 

After  several  years  passed  in  wandering  and  exile,  the 
merits  of  his  personal  character  prevailed  against  the  remem- 
brance of  his  political  aberrations,  and  an  act  of  royal  clemency, 
generously  conceded  without  any  humiliating  conditions,  re- 
stored him  once  more  to  his  country.  There  he  has  since 
resided,  in  the  bosom  of  domestic  quiet,  and  in  the  habitual 
exercise  of  every  virtue  that  can  ennoble  private  life.  He  has 
the  satisfaction,  too,  in  his  old  age,  of  finding  that,  in  a  public 
point  of  view,  his  debt  of  gratitude  to  the  Crown  has  not  been 
wholly  unpaid.  In,  his  eldest  son  (Captain  Hamilton,  of  the 
Cambrian  frigate)  he  has  given  to  the  British  nav}T  one  of  its 
most  gallant  and  distinguished  commanders,  and  for  whose 
sake  alone  every  man  of  a  generous  spirit  should  abstain  from 
gratuitous  and  cruel  railings  at  the  obsolete  politics  of  the 
father.* 

Hamilton  Rowan's  exterior  is  full  of  interest.  Whether  you 
meet  him  abroad  or  in  a  drawing-room,  you  are  struck  at  once 
with  his  physical  pre-eminence.  Years  have  now  rendered 
his  frame  less  erect,  but  all  the  proportions  of  a  noble  model 
remain.  In  his  youth  he  was  remarkable  for  feats  of  strength 
and  activity.  The  latter  quality  was  put  to  no  ordinary  test, 
in  a  principal  incident  of  his  life,  to  which  I  shall  presently 
refer.  His  face,  both  in  feature  and  expression,  is  in  strict 
accordance  with  the  rest  of  his  person.  It  has  nothing  deno- 
ting extraordinary  comprehension,  or  subtlety  of  intellect ;  but 
in  its  masculine  outline,  which  the  workings  of  time  have 
brought  out  into  more  prominent  relief — in  the  high  and  bushy 

*  Tin's  son,  who  died  before  his  venerable  father,  eminently  distinguished  him- 
self in  the  contest  for  the  independence  of  Greece,  and  his  father  never  recov- 
ered his  loss. —  IV 


232  ARCHIBALD   HAMILTON   ROWAN. 

brow  —  the  unblenching  eye  —  the  compressed  lips,  and  in  the 
composed  yet  somewhat  stern  stability  of  expression  that  marks 
the  whole,  you  find  the  symbols  of  high  moral  determination  — 
of  fidelity  to  principle  —  of  self-reliance  and  self-oblivion,  and 
above  all  of  an  uncompromising  personal  courage,  that  could 
front  every  form  of  danger  face  to  face.* 

The  austerity  of  his  countenance  vanishes  the  moment  he 
addresses  you.  His  manners  have  all  the  fascination  of  the 
old  school.  Every  tone  of  his  voice  is  softened  by  an  innate 
and  undeviating  courtesy  that  makes  no  distinctions  of  rank 
or  sex.  In  the  trivial  details  of  common  life,  Hamilton  Rowan 
is  as  gentle  and  complimentary  to-  men  as  other  men  are  in 
their  intercourse  with  females.  This  suavity  of  demeanor  is 
not  the  velvet  of  art;  it  is  only  one  of  the  signs  of  a  compre- 
hensive philanthropy,  which  as  habitually  breaks  out  in  acts 
of  genuine  sympathy  and  munificent  relief,  wherever  a  case  of 
human  suffering  occurs  within  its  range. 

The  circumstances  of  Hamilton  Rowan's  escape  from  im- 
prisonment, as  I  once  heard  them  minutely  detailed,  possessed 
all  the  interest  of  a  romantic  narrative.  The  following  are 
such  of  the  leading  particulars  as  I  can  recall,  to  my  recollec- 
tion. Having  discovered  (on  the  28th  of  April,  1794)  the 
extent  of  the  danger  in  which  he  was  involved,  he  arranged  a 

*  Archibald  Hamilton  Rowan,  who  must  have  been  a  giant  in  his  prime, 
was  one  of  the  most  remarkable  men  I  ever  saw.  One  might  almost  think  he 
had  been  made  for  one  purpose  —  digito  monstrari  !  He  was  long  past  seventy 
when  I  saw  him.  In  stature  he  was  even  as  one  of  the  sons  of  Anak.  His 
strongly-marked  features  indicated  firmness  and  benevolence.  His  eyes,  dark 
and  flashing,  beneath  shaggy  brows.  His  port,  lofty.  His  stride,  large.  His 
manners,  of  the  old  school  of  gentlest  courtesy  —  but  his  frown,  when  offended 
or  excited,  positively  frightening !  Crowds  used  to  watch  for  a  sight  of  this 
fine  "  old  Irish  gentleman,"  as  he  came  out  of  the  club-house  in  Kildare  street, 
bearing  in  his  hand  a  mighty  blackthorn  (which  might  have  served  Hercules 
for  a  club),  and  escorted,  on  either  side,  by  two  immense  Irish  wolf-dogs,  re- 
ported to  be  the  veiy  last  of  their  race.  Looking  at  him,  and  surveying  the  gen- 
eration among  whom  he  towered,  like  a  forest-oak  over  a  crowd  of  plantation 
shrubs,  a  contemplative  man  might  sigh,  and  utter,  "  There  were  Men  —  in  the 
days  when  he  began  to  live."  Mr.  Rowan  died  in  November,  1834,  aged 
eighty-four.  In  his  latter  years  he  was  much  afflicted  with  deafness,  and  grief 
for  his  gallant  son,  Captain  Hamilton,  who  died  before  him,  had  affected  his 
strong  and  truly  masculine  mind. —  M 


SIS   ESCAPE.  233 

plan  of  flight  to  be  put  into  execution  on  the  night  of  the  1st 
of  May.  He  had  the  address  to  prevail  on  the  jailer  of  New- 
gate, who  knew  nothing  farther  of  his  prisoner  than  that  he 
was  under  sentence  of  confinement  for  a  political  libel,  to 
accompany  him  at  night  to  Mr.  Rowan's  own  house.*  They 
were  received  by  Mrs.  R.,  who  had  a  supper  prepared  in  the 
front  room  of  the  second  floor.  The  supper  over,  the  prisoner 
requested  the  jailer's  permission  to  say  a  word  or  two  in  private 
to  his  wife  in  the  adjoining  room.  The  latter  consented,  on 
the  condition  of  the  door  between  the  two  rooms  remaining 
open.  He  had  so  little  suspicion  of  what  was  meditated,  that 
instead  of  examining  the  state  of  this  other  room,  he  contented 
himself  with  shifting  his  chair  at  the  supper-table  so  as  to  give 
him  a  view  of  the  open  doorway.  In  a  few  seconds  his  pris- 
oner was  beyond  his  reach,  having  descended  by  a  single  rope, 
which  had  been  slung  from  the  window  of  the  back  chamber. 

In  his  stable  he  found  a  horse  ready  saddled,  and  a  peas- 
ant's outside  coat  to  disguise  him.f  With  these  he  posted  to 
the  house  of  his  attorney,  Matthew  Dowling,  who  was  in  the 
secret  of  his  design,  and  had  promised  to  contribute  to  its 
success  by  his  counsel  and  assistance.  Dowling  was  at  home, 
but  unfortunately  his  house  was  full  of  company.  He  came 
out  to  the  street  to  Mr.  Rowan,  who  personated  the  character 
of  a  country  client,  and  hastily  pointing  out  the  great  risk  to 
be  incurred  from  any  attempt  to  give  him  refuge  in  his  own 
house,  directed  him  to  proceed  to  the  Rotunda  (a  public  build- 
ing in  Sackville  street,  with  an  open  space  in  front)  and  re- 
main there  until  Dowling  could  despatch  his  guests,  and  come 
to  him.  Irish  guests  were  in  those  days  rather  slow  to  separ- 
ate from  the  bottle.  For  one  hour  and  a  half  the  fugitive  had 
to  wait,  leading  his  horse  up  and  down  before  the  Rotunda, 
and  tortured  between  fear  and  hope  at  the  appearance  of  every 
person  that  approached.  He  has  often  represented  this  as  the 
most  trying  moment  of  his  life. 

*  In  order,  he  pretended,  to  make  out  a  deed,  as  fear  had  been  expressed 
that  such  an  instrument  signed  in  prison  would  be  invalid. —  M. 

t  Rowan  states,  in  his  autobiography,  by  which  I  correct  Mr.  Sheil's  narrative, 
that,  when  he  was  in  his  wife's  room,  he  changed  his  dress  "f  a  herdsman. —  M 


234  ARCHIBALD    HAMILTON    ROWAN. 

Dowling  at  length  arrived,  and  after  a  sliort  and  anxious 
conference,  advised  him  to  mount  his  horse,  and  make  for  the 
country-house  of  their  friend  Mr.  Sweetman,  which  was  situate 
about  four  miles  off,  on  the  northern  side  of  the  bay  of  Dublin, 
This  place  he  reached  in  safety,  and  found  there  the  refuge 
and  aid  which  he  sought.*  After  a  delay  of  two  or  three  days 
Mr.  Sweetman  engaged  three  boatmen  of  the  neighborhood  to 
man  his  own  pleasure-boat,  and  convey  Hamilton  Rowan  to 
the  coast  of  France.  They  put  to  sea  at  night;  but  a  gale  of 
wind  coming  on,  they  were  compelled  to  put  back,  and  take 
shelter  under  the  lee  of  the  Hill  of  Howth.  While  at  anchor 
there  on  the  following  morning  a  small  revenue-cruiser  sailing 
by  threw  into  the  boat  copies  of  the  proclamations  that  had 
been  issued,  offering  two  thousand  pounds  sterling  for  the  ap- 
prehension of  Hamilton  Rowan.  The  weather  having  moder- 
ated, the  boat  pushed  out  to  sea  again.  They  had  reached  the 
mid-channel,  when  a  situation  occurred  almost  equalling  in 
dramatic  interest  the  celebrated  Ccesarem  vekis  of  antiquity. 
It  would  certainly  make  a  fine  subject  for  a  picture.  As  the 
boat  careered  along  before  a  favorable  wind,  the  exiled  Irish- 
man perceived  the  boatmen  grouped  apart,  perusing  one  of  the 
proclamations,  and.  by  their  significant  looks  and  gestures, 
discovering  that  they  had  recognised  the  identity  of  their 
passenger,  with  the  printed  description.  "Your  conjectures 
are  right,  my  lads,"  said  Rowan,  "my  life  is  in  your  hands  — 
but  you  are  Irishmen."  They  flung  the  proclamation  over- 
board, and  the  boat  continued  her  course.!     On  the  third  morn- 

*  The  moment  his  escape  from  prison  was  known,  parties  of  soldiers  were  sent 
in  pursuit  of  him,  in  all  directions,  and  in  his  place  of  concealment  he  could 
hear  their  measured  tiead. —  M. 

t  It  is  now  several  years  since  the  particulars  of  Mr.  Rowan's  escape  were 
related  to  me  by  a  friend,  as  they  had  been  communicated  to  him  by  the  prin- 
cipal actor  himself;  and  my  present  recollection  is  that  the  above  incident  was 
not  included.  I  have  often  heard  it,  as  I  have  given  it,  from  other  sources. 
[What  little  money  Rowan  had  with  him,  he  divided  equally  among  these 
noble  men,  to  whose  genei'osity  and  quick  sense  of  honor  he  owed  his  life — ■ 
for  had  he  been  recaptured,  he  would  assuredly  have  been  tried,  and,  if  tried, 
convicted,  as  his  co-conspirator  Jackson  was. — There  is  an  anecdote  connected 
with  Jackson's  not  escaping  which  interests  me  much  more  than  Rowan's  es- 
cape.    Jackson  was  an  Irish  clergyman  sent  over  from  France,  in  1794   to  as- 


jaqivSon's  chivalry.  235 

ing,  a  little  after  break  of  day,  they  arrived  within  view  of 
St.  Paul  de  Leon,  a  fortified  town,  on  the  coast  of  Bretagne. 
As  the  sun  rose,  it  dispersed  a  dense  fog  that  had  prevailed 
overnight,  and  discovered  a  couple  of  miles  behind  them,  mov- 
ing along  under  easy  sail,  the  British  Channel  fleet,  through 
the  thick  of  which  their  little  boat  had  just  shot  unperceived. 

The  party,  having  landed,  were  arrested  as  spies,  and  cast 
into  prison,  but  in  a  few  days  an  order  from  the  French  govern- 
ment procured  their  liberation.  Hamilton  Rowan  proceeded 
to  Paris,  from  which,  in  a  political  convulsion  that  shortly  en- 
sued, it  was  his  fate  once  more  to  seek  for  safety  in  flight.  Tie 
escaped  this  time  unaccompanied,  in  a  wherry,  which  he  rowed 
himself  down  the  Seine.  The  banks  were  lined  with  military  ; 
but  he  answered  their  challenges  with  so  much  address,  that  he 
was  allowed  to  pass  on  unmolested.  Having  reached  a  French 
port,  he  embarked  for  the  United  States  of  America,  where,  at 
length,  he  found  a  secure  asylum. 

Hamilton  Rowan,  though  of  Irish  blood,  was  born  and  edu- 
cated in  England.  In  his  youth  he  acquired  a  large  property 
under  the  will  of  his  maternal  grandfather,  Mr.  Rowan,  a  bar- 
rister and  lay-fellow  of  Trinity  College,  Dublin,  who,  in  a  kind 
of  prophetic  spirit,  made  it  a  condition  of  the  bequest,  "that 
his  grandson  should  not  come  to  Ireland  until  after  he  should 
be  twenty-five  years  old." 

certain  whether  if  the  Directory  invaded  Ireland,  the  mass  of  the  people  would 
receive  the  French.  He  communicated  his  business  to  an  attorney  in  London, 
who  sold  him  to  Pitt,  and  was  employed  to  follow  Jackson  to  Ireland  and  watch 
him.  After  a  time,  the  informer  "gave  tongue,"  and  Jackson  was  arrested  — 
he  was  subsequently  tried  (the  first  case  of  high  treason  in  Ireland  for  more 
than  a  century),  convicted,  and  brought  up  for  judgment,  but  he  evaded  it,  by 
taking  poison,  and  died  in  the  dock,  his  last  words,  which  were  addressed  to 
Curran,  being  those  of  Pierre,  "  We  have  deceived,  the  senate."  When  in 
prison,  Jackson  was  visited  by  a  friend  who  remained  until  late  at  night.  Jack- 
son went  with  him  to  the  door  where  the  jailer  generally  waited.  They  found 
the  man  asleep  and  the  prison-keys  hy  his  side,  on  the  ground.  Jackson 
took  them  up,  opened  the  prison-door,  and  was  urged  hy  his  friend  to  escape. 
He  hesitated  for  a  moment — "  No,"  said  he,  "  I  could  do  it,  but  what  would. 
the  consequences  be  to  this  poor  fellow,  who  has  been  so  kind  to  me?  Let 
me  remain  and  meet  my  fate."  He  closed  the  door,  turning  from  his  friend 
and  liherty,  locked  himself  in,  and  resumed  his  place  in  the  dungeon. —  M.] 


JOHN  LESLIE   FOSTER. 

The  iirst  opportunity  I  had  of  closely  observing  the  eminent 
statesman  and  celebrated  legislator  whose  name  is  prefixed  to 
this  article,  was  afforded  by  the  Louth  election  [1826J.  Mr.  Fos- 
ter is  so  intimately  connected  with  that  remarkable  event,  that 
some  account  of  the  details  which  accompanied  it  will  not 
be  inappropriate.  The  standard  of  the  Association  had  been 
raised  in  Waterford,  and  Villiers  Stuart  proclaimed  himself  the 
antagonist  of  the  House  of  Ourraghmore.  All  eyes  were  directed 
to  the  field  in  which  the  great  contest  was  to  be  waged.  Both 
the  combatants  brought  hereditary  rank  and  vast  opulence  as 
their  allies,  besides  the  auxiliary  passions  of  the  powerful  par- 
ties to  which  they  were  respectively  attached.  There  was, 
however,  nothing  surprising  in  the  enterprise  of  Mr.  Stuart. 
During  his  minority,  the  savings  of  his  estate  had  accumulated 
to  a  very  large  sum,  and  he  was  possessed  of  the  means  of 
engaging  in  a  bold  political  adventure,  without  running  any 
risk  of  permanently  injuring  his  fortune.  It  would  have  been 
far  stranger  if,  with  his  large  property  and  his  enlightened 
opinions,  he  had  allowed  the  Beresfords  to  maintain  an  undis- 
puted masterdom  in  his  county. 

While  the  national  attention  was  fixed  upon  the  events 
which  were  taking  place  in  Waterford,  news  arrived  in  Dublin 
which  excited  a  far  greater  sensation  than  the  contest  between 
the  two  rival  patricians  of  Dromona  and  Ourraghmore;  and  it 
was  announced  that  Mr.  Alexander  Dawson,  a  retired  barrister 
with  a  small  fortune,  had  started  for  Louth.  In  that  county 
the  Protestant  gentry  were  regarded  as  omnipotent.  For 
upward  of  half  a  century,  the  Jocelyns  and  the  Fosters  had 


LOUTH    ELECTICN.  237 

returned  two  members  to  Parliament,  and  divided  the  county, 
like  a.  family  borough,  between  them.  A  strong  and  appa- 
rently indissoluble  coalition  had  been  effected  between  Lord 
Roden*  and  Lord  Oriel;  and  it  was  supposed  to  be  impossible 
to  make  any  effectual  opposition  to  the  union  of  Orangeism 
and  of  Evangelism,  which  the  wily  veteran  of  Ascendency,  and 
the  frantic  champion  of  the  New  Reformation,  had  effected. 

To  this  combination  of  power  Mr.  Dawson  had  neither 
wealth  nor  connections  to  oppose.  He  had  even  intimated 
that  he  would  not  bear  any  portion  of  the  expenses,  and 
must  be  returned  by  popular  contribution.  The  ordinary 
preparations  had  not  been  made,  and  it  was  only  three  days 
before  the  election  commenced  that  his  intention  was  de- 
clared. Leslie  Foster  affected  to  treat  his  pretensions  with 
derision.  He  was  to  be  seen  among  groups  of  sympathizing 
king's  counsel,  and  assentating  assistant-barristers,  with  his 
forefinger  and  thumb  brought  into  syllogistic  conjunction, 
demonstrating  the  utter  absurdity  of  Alexander  Dawson  in 
attempting  a  contest.  A  profound  seriousness  habitually  per- 
vades the  countenance  of  Mr.  Foster,  who,  accustomed  to  the 
most  abstruse  meditations  upon  political  economy,  and  con- 
versant with  the  deepest  mysteries  of  legislation,  has  seldom 

*  The  Earl  of  Roden  (who  sits  in  the  House  of  Lords  as  Baron  Clanbrassill, 
in  the  peerage  of  the  United  Kingdom),  is  now,  in  1854,  in  his  sixty-sixth  year. 
He  was  long  notorious  for  his  connection  with  the  Orange  faction,  and  has 
taken  great  interest  in  all  attempts  at  changing  Irish  Catholics  (when  food  is 
scarce)  into  nominal  converts.  When  the  potato  crop  turns  out  favorably,  the 
"  reformed"  lapse  into  their  ancient  faith.  It  was  believed  that  Lord  Roden's 
great  test  of  a  "  renewed  spirit"  was  the  partaking  of  meat,  on  a  Friday  —  hence 
they  were  called  "  leg-of-mutton  converts."  However  misplaced  his  political 
and  polemical  zeal,  Lord  Roden  is  a  good  landlord.  He  has  a  pension  of 
twenty-seven  hundred  pounds  sterling,  for  the  aboHshed  office  of  Auditor-Gener- 
al in  Ireland. —  His  eldest  son,  Viscount  Jocelyn,  born  in  1816,  was  military  sec- 
retary to  the  Chinese  Expedition,  and  is  author  of  "  Six  Months  in  China."' 
He  afterward  held  office  under  Sir  Robert  Peel  (from  February,  1845,  to  July, 
1846),  as  one  of  the  Secretaries  of  the  India  Board.  He  is  a  moderate  conser- 
vative, and  a  well-informed,  unpresuming  man.  His  wife,  one  of  the  hand- 
somest women  in  the  Court  of  Victoria  (she  is  daughter  of  Lady  Palmerston, 
by  her  first  marriage)  is  a  Lady  of  the  Bedchamber  to  the  Queen. — Viscount 
Jocelyn  has  a  seat  in  the  House  of  Commons,  as  member  for  Lynn  Regis,  in, 
the  county  of  Norfolk,  for  which  borough  he  was  first  elected  in  1842. —  M. 


238  JOHN    LESLIE    FOSTER. 

been  known  to  use  the  risible  organs  for  the  purposes  for 
which  they  were  originally  intended.  The  notion  of  a  contest 
in  Louth,  however,  seemed  to  strike  him  as  so  exceedingly 
ludicrous  and  extravagant,  that  upon  this  occasion  he  broke 
through  all  the  rules  of  solemnity  by  which  his  physiognomy 
is  usually  controlled.  Still,  he  had  left  off  laughing  for  such 
a  length  of  time,  that  his  smile  sat  uneasily  and  unnaturally 
upon  him,  and  the  muscles  of  merriment  had  become  so  rusty 
and  so  destitute  of  pliability,  that  they  accommodated  them 
selves  slowly  and  ponderously  to  their  functions ;  and  many 
of  his  friends,  observing  these  novel  phenomena  of  mirth,  ex 
claimed,  "  What  can  be  the  matter  with  Leslie  Foster !"  He, 
however,  made  ample  compensation  for  this  sudden  and  un- 
meet deviation  from  his  habitual  gravity,  by  the  seriousness 
of  his  aspect,  upon  his  appearance  at  the  hustings  of  Dundalk. 
I  proceeded  there  before  the  arrival  of  Mr.  Foster. 

From  the  brow  of  a  hill  which  surmounts  the  town,  when 
I  was  at  a  short  distance  from  it,  I  saw  a  vast  multitude 
descending  with  banners  of  green  unfurled  to  the  wind,  and 
shouting  as  they  moved  along.  I  could  not  at  first  discern 
with  distinctness  the  gentleman  who  was  the  immediate  object 
of  this  wild  ovation  ;  but,  on  approaching  and  mixing  with  the 
dense  mass  of  enthusiastic  patriots  myself,  I  saw,  seated  in  an 
old  gig,  Mr.  Alexander  Dawson,  the  aspiring  candidate  who 
had  presumed  to  enter  the  lists  with  the  hereditary  representa- 
tives of  the  County  of  Louth.  He  wore  an  old  frock-coat  cov 
ered  with  dust,  and  a  broad-brimmed,  weather-beaten  hat, 
which  surmounted  a  head  that  streamed  with  profuse  perspira- 
tion ;  his  face  was  ruddy  with  heat,  but,  notwithstanding  the 
excitement  of  the  scene,  preserved  its  habitual  character  of 
sagacious  quietism  and  tranquil  intelligence.  He  did  not  seem 
to  be  (though  placed  in  a  most  extraordinary  and  trying  situa- 
tion) at  all  conscious  of  the  boldness  of  the  enterprise  in  which 
he  was  embarked,  and  was  perhaps  the  least  moved  of  the 
multitude  that  were  rushing  rapidly  on ;  while  the  people 
were  hurraing  about  him,  throwing  their  hats  into  the  air,  and 
catching  them  with  a  wild  shriek  and  prance  (a  common  de- 
notement of  joy  among  the  lower  Irish),  he  sat  composedly  in 


:LOUTH  election.  239 

his  old  vehicle,  and  was  busy  in  preserving  order  and  regu- 
larity in  the  procession.  There  were  some  three  or  four  rag- 
ged fiddlers  before  him,  who  played  with  all  their  might,  and 
in  notes  of  the  harshest  discord,  a  tune  which  they  intended  for 
the  popular  air  of  "  Nancy  Dawson,"  and  which  they  selected 
for  no  other  reason  than  that  it  was  connected  with  his  name. 
It  was  only  at  intervals  that  the  hard  and  vigorous  scraping 
of  these  village  violins  was  distinctly  audible  ;  for  the  cries 
of  "Down  with  Foster!"  and  "Dawson  for  ever!"  resounded 
from  every  side  in  yells  of  vehement  uproar,  and  monopolized 
the  hearing  faculties.  A  wonderful  enthusiasm  prevailed 
through  this  vast  gathering;  and  in  the  faces  of  the  fierce  and 
athletic  peasants  who  drew  their  favorite  on,  as  they  occasion- 
ally turned  their  heads  back  to  look  on  him,  and  shouted  in 
the  retrospect,  the  strongest  passions  of  mingled  joy,  ferocity, 
and  determination,  were  expressed. 

In  a  few  minutes  Mr.  Dawson  and  his  gig  were  drawn  into 
the  main  street  of  Dundalk,  and  stopped  at  Magrath's  hotel, 
which  was  the  rendezvous  of  patriotism  during  the  election. 
There  the  committee,  which  had  been  hastily  gotten  up,  was 
collected,  and  welcomed  Mr.  Dawson  on  his  arrival.  He  de- 
scended amid  loud  acclamations,  and  soon  after  appeared  at  a 
window  in  the  tavern,  whence  he  addressed  the  people.  Sev- 
eral thousands  were  assembled,  and  in  an  instant  deep  silence 
was  obtained.  In  a  plain,  brief,  perfectly  simple,  and  intelli- 
gible speech,  Mr.  Dawson  told  them  that  for  their  sake,  and 
not  to  gratify  his  personal  ambition,  he  was  determined  to 
oppose  Mr.  Foster  and  Mr.  Fortescue,  and  to  break  the  Oriel 
and  the  Roden  yoke.  His  speech  was  received  with  the  most 
rapturous  plaudits,  and  it  was  manifest  that,  whatever  might 
be  the  issue,  a  spirit  had  arisen  among  the  people  which  por- 
tended far  more  than  could  have  been  originally  calculated 
While  Mr.  Dawson  and  others  of  the  same  party  were  addres- 
sing the  people,  the  carriages  of  the  leading  gentry,  drawn 
by  four  horses,  were  seen  entering  the  town,  but,  in  order  to 
avoid  the  multitude,  wheeled  round  through  a  street  parallel 
to  that  in  the  opening  of  which  the  people  were  gathered. 
4-stonishment   and    apprehension  were  visible   in   their  faces. 


240  JOHN    LESLIE   FOSTER. 

They  perceived  already  that  a  dreadful  struggle  was  about  to 
take  place. 

The  wonted  harangues  having  been  delivered  to  the  people, 
Mr.  Dawson  and  his  committee  proceeded  to  the  Court-house, 
which  occupies  one  side  of  a  square  in  the  centre  of  the  town. 
This  building  presents  in  its  exterior  a  very  beautiful  object. 
It  was  erected  under  the  immediate  superintendence  of  Mr. 
Foster,  who  furnished  the  design,  which  he  took  from  the 
Temple  of  Theseus;  for  Mr.  Foster  values  himself  upon  a  uni- 
versality of  acquisition,  and  is  a  sort  of  walking  encyclopedia, 
or  peripatetic  repertory  of  all  the  arts  and  sciences,  and  is  as 
profoundly  skilled  in  architecture  as  he  is  in  any  of  the  crafts 
of  the  Custom-House  or  the  mysteries  of  the  Excise.  Opening 
Stuart's  Athens,  he  lighted  on  the  Temple  of  Theseus,  and 
selected  it  as  a  model  for  a  Court-house  at  Dundalk;  and, 
accordingly,  the  most  beautiful  and  inconvenient  temple  in 
which  the  rites  of  justice  have  ever  been  performed  has  been 
produced  under  his  architectural  auspices. 

In  that  part  of  this  incongruous  edifice  which  is  allocated  to 
the  County  business,  the  High-Sheriff  assembled  the  free- 
holders to  read  the  writ.  On  his  left  hand  stood  Mr.  Leslie 
Foster.  How  changed  from  him  who  had,  a  few  hours  before, 
derided  as  impotent  the  efforts  of  the  Roman  Catholic  body  to 
push  him  from  his  stool  in  the  legislature  !  His  complexion  is 
naturally  pale,  but  it  now  became  deadly-white.  He  surveyed 
the  dense  mass  of  the  people  with  awe,  and  seemed  to  recoil 
from  the  groans  and  hootings  with  which  he  was  clamorously 
assailed.  When  proposed  as  a  candidate,  he  delivered  a 
speech,  in  which  he  clumsily  sought  to  reconcile  his  auditors 
to  his  resistance  of  their  claims,  and  appeared  to  be  aware  of 
the  wretchedness  of  the  task  which  he  had  imposed  upon  him- 
self. The  only  relief  which  he  received  was  derived  fiom  the 
execration  which  the  mention  of  Lord  Roden  and  his  party 
produced  in  the  assembly;  for,  obnoxious  as  that  nobleman  is 
through  the  rest  of  Ireland,  his  fanaticism  and  narrow-hearted- 
ness  have  secured  for  him  a  more  condensed  and  concentrated 
odium  in  the  town  of  Dundalk.  Mr.  Dawson  spoke  with  equal 
brevity  and  perspicuity,  and   made   it  his  boast  that  he  be- 


LOUTH    ELECTION.  241 

longed  to  the  middle  classes,  and  was  best  calculated  to  repre- 
sent their  feelings  and  to  do  justice  to  their  interests. 

On  the  succeeding  day  the  polling  commenced  with  activity, 
Mr.  Fortescue  being  sustained  by  the  Roden  influence  and  a 
large  portion  of  the  Protestant  aristocracy;  the  rest  of  that 
body  were  the  supporters  of  Mr.  Foster;  while  Mr.  Dawson 
relied  upon  a  few  Roman  Catholics  of  fortune,  and  on  the  spirit 
of  agrarian  insurrection,  which  had  broken  out  among  the 
forty-shilling  freeholders.  For  the  first  few  days,  Mr.  Foster 
and  Mr.  Fortescue  acted  in  conjunction,  because  they  calcu- 
lated that  they  should  be  able  to  throw  Mr.  Dawson  out;  but, 
after  some  demonstration  of  the  poAver  of  the  people,  the  agent 
for  Mr.  Fortescue  (Mr.  Johnson)  broke  off  the  coalition,  and 
the  three  candidates  rested  upon  their  individual  resources. 

In  this  state  of  things,  Mr.  Sheil,  who  Avas  counsel  for  Mr. 
Dawson,  applied  to  Mr.  Johnson,  as  agent  for  Mr.  Fortescue, 
and  offered  to  give  him  a  certain  number  of  votes,  upon  con- 
dition that  Mr.  Fortescue  should  co-operate  with  the  popular 
party  in  throwing  Mr.  Foster  out ;  but  Mr.  Johnson,  confident 
at  the  time  that  Lord  Roden's  interest  was  paramount,  declined 
to  accede  to  a  proposition  which  it  is  probable  his  employer 
would  have  regarded  as  unworthy  of  him.  Mr.  Fortescue  was, 
however,  outwitted  by  Leslie  Foster;  for  the  coalition  of  the 
first  days  threw  so  many  additional  votes  into  the  scale,  as 
enabled  him,  ultimately,  though  only  by  a  very  small  major- 
ity, to  defeat  his  incautious  and  unskilful  auxiliary. 

Some  time  elapsed  before  any  decided  demonstrations  of 
superiority  took  place  ;  and  the  exertions  of  all  parties  were 
prodigious.  Emissaries  were  despatched  night  and  day 
through  every  part  of  the  county,  and  no  means  of  persuasion 
were  spared  by  the  Catholic,  or  of  terror  by  the  Protestant 
faction,  to  bring  the  freeholders  in.  Priests  and  attorneys 
were  seen  scouring  the  country  in  all  directions,  and  landlords 
and  drivers,  armed  with  warrants  of  distress,  knocked  at  the 
door  of  every  hovel.  The  spirit  of  exertion  which  animated 
the  contending  parties  extended  itself  to  the  counsel,  and  Mr. 
North  (the  brother-in-law  of  Mr.  Foster),  Mr.  Murray,  who 
was  employed  by  Mr.  Fortescue,  and  Mr.  Sheil,  who  acted  for 

y9h  IL— 1  1  ' 


2-12  JOHN    LESLIE    FOSTER. 

Mr.  Dawson,  in  the  Higli  Sheriff's  booth,  exhibited  a  zeal  and 
alacrity  which  a  mere  professional  sympathy  with  their  clients 
could  scarcely  have  supplied. 

The  Sheriff's  booth  was  in  a  small  room  adjoining  the  Coun- 
ty-court, and  offered,  through  the  iron  bars  of  its  single  win- 
dow on  the  ground-floor,  a  dismal  spectacle.  A  wall,  at  the 
distance  of  about  four  feet  from  this  window,  rises  to  a  consid- 
erable height,  and  forms  a  small  quadrangular  space,  covered 
with  rank  grass  and  broken  stones,  in  which  the  murderers  at 
Wildgoose  Lodge  are  buried.  In  intervals  of  leisure,  the  eyes 
of  the  persons,  whose  business  it  was  to  remain  in  this  room, 
would  involuntarily  rest  upon  this  spot,  and  the  conversation 
turned  from  the  subject  of  the  election  to  the  terrible  atrocity 
of  which  that  dreary  piece  of  ground  was  the  memorial.  The 
meditations  which  it  supplied  were,  however,  of  brief  duration, 
for  a  question  connected  with  a  vote  would  arise  to  dissolve 
them. 

As  the  election  proceeded,  the  anxieties  of  Mr.  Foster  aug- 
mented. He  seemed  to  lose  all  command  and  self-possession. 
He  would  rush  into  the  Sheriff's  booth  with  a  precipitate 
vehemence,  which  was  the  more  remarkable  from  the  contrast 
which  it  formed  with  his  usual  systematic  and  well-ordered  be- 
havior. "  Soldiers  !"  he  would  cry,  "  soldiers,  Mr.  High-Sher- 
iff! I  call  upon  you  to  bring  out  troops,  to  protect  me  and 
my  supporters.  My  life  is  in  peril  —  my  brother  has  just  been 
assailed  —  we  shall  be  massacred,  if  you  persevere  in  exclu- 
ding troops  from  the  town  !"  Such  were  the  exclamations  he 
would  utter,  under  the  influence  of  mingled  anger  and  alarm  ; 
for  I  believe  that  his  fears,  though  utterly  unfounded,  were 
sincere.  To  these  appeals  the  friends  of  Mr.  Dawson  would 
oppose  equally  vehement  adjurations.  "  What !  call  out  troops ! 
bayonet  the  people  !  No,  Mr.  Foster;  the  scenes  of  1798  are 
not  returned  ;  the  Sheriff  will  not  be  deluded  by  the  phantoms 
which  issue  from  your  over-excited  imagination,  or  accede  to 
your  sanguinary  invocations." 

The  High-Sheriff  was  placed  in  a  very  embarrassing  condi- 
tion in  the  midst  of  this  uproar  of  remonstrance.  It  was  said 
$hat  his  leanings  were  personally  favorable  to  Mr.  Foster;  but 


LOtJTfl.    ELECTION.  MS 

he  is  a  brewer  of  the  famous  Castlebellingham  ale,  and  the  in- 
terests of  his  brewery  being  at  variance  with  his  political  pre- 
dilections (if  he  have  any),  he  was  kept  in  a  state  of  painful 
hesitation,  until  Mr.  Chaigneau,  who  acted  with  the  utmost 
impartiality  as  Assessor,  resolved  his  difficulties,  by  very  prop- 
erly stating,  that  when  evidence  of  danger  should  be  laid  be- 
fore the  Sheriff  upon  oath,  he  would  act  upon  it.  The  town 
remained  perfectly  peaceable.  There  were,  indeed,  loud  cries 
and  vehement  shoutings,  but  no  personal  molestation  was  of- 
fered to  anybody.  A  perpetual  procession  of  fiddlers  and  fife- 
players  moved  through  the  streets,  who  played  no  other  air 
than  "Nancy  Dawson"  from  morning  until  twelve  at  night. 

At  the  head  of  this  body  of  everlasting  minstrels  were  two 
singular  persons,  who  carried  large  banners  of  green  silk,  with 
national  emblems  and  mottoes  figured  upon  them.  One  of  these 
strange  individuals  was  a  doctor  —  a  large,  bloated,  plethoric 
mass  of  a  man,  dressed  in  old  rusty  black,  covered  with  snuff, 
with  a  protuberant  belly,  and  a  short,  waddling  gait,  which  a 
quantity  of  matutinal  potations  had  rendered  exceedingly  un- 
steady ;  while  his  countenance,  composed  of  large  blotches 
of  orbicular  red,  with  a  pair  of  large  glazed  eyes,  surmounted 
by  white  shaggy  eyebrows,  confirmed  the  conjectures  which 
the  irregularity  of  his  movements  suggested.  The  doctor  car- 
ried the  Dawson  standard,  having  two  or  three  stout  fellows 
to  co-operate  in  his  sustainment.  When  he  arrived  at  the 
end  of  the  street,  in  turning  round  to  direct  the  procession,  of 
which  he  was  the  chief  leader,  the  doctor  would  utter  a  loud 
but  inarticulate  shout,  and  return  toward  the  courthouse;  and 
when  he  had  arrived  there,  he  would  again  wheel  about  at 
the  head  of  the  multitude  with  a  similar  hurrah.  Thus,  he 
traversed,  from  morning  till  sunset,  the  principal  street  of  the 
town,  taking  a  glass  of  Irish  restorative  at  brief  intervals  in 
these  strange  perambulations. 

Next  in  command  to  the  doctor  was  old  Harry  Mills,  whose 
fame  has  since  travelled  across  the  Atlantic,  and  who  has  not 
only  had  his  health  drunk  in  America,  but  has  received  a  sub- 
scription of  Jwenty  pounds  from  the  New  World.  This  peas- 
ant was  among  the  most  conspicuous  figures  at  the  Louth  eleo 


344  JOITN    LESLIE   FOSTEit. 

tion.  He  Lad  about  four  acres  of  land,  for  which  he  paid  a 
high  rent  to  his  landlord;  and  although  he  completely  depend- 
ed on  him,  this  "village  Hampden,"  as  he  was  called,  with- 
stood the  petty  despotism  of  Mr.  Woulfe  M'Neil,  and  voted  in 
despite  of  him  for  Mr.  Dawson.  Harry  Mills  had  gone  through 
many  a  wild  adventure.  He  had  been  concerned  in  the  affair 
of  1798,  and  was  obliged  to  fly  the  country  ;  but,  as  he  said 
himself,  he  had  the  consolation  of  seeing  an  Orangeman's 
house  on  fire  upon  the  shore,  as  he  was  sailing  in  a  fishing- 
boat  from  the  port  of  Dundalk.  "Please  your  honor,"  Harry 
used  to  say,  "  as  I  was  leaving  ould  Ireland,  I  saw  the  flames 
blazing  out  of  the  Cromwellian's  house  ;  and  many  a  time, 
when  I  was  keeping  watch  on  the  coast  of  Guinea,  I  used  to 
think  of  that  same  fire."  Harry  was  obliged  to  turn  seaman, 
and  became  a  sailor  in  a  slave-ship.  He  was  taken  by  a 
French  privateer;  and  I  do  not  recollect  exactly  how  he  con- 
trived, after  years  had  passed,  to  get  back  to  Ireland.  His 
spirit  slumbered  within  him  until  the  Louth  election,  and  then 
it  broke  forth,  like  the  flame  from  the  Orangeman's  house, 
which  had  ministered  with  its  flashes  to  his  retrospective  con- 
solations. With  that  ocean-look  and  attitude  which  belong  to 
all  seafaring  people,  Harry  blended  the  sly  cunning  and  observ- 
ant sagacity  which  characterize  the  Irish  peasant,  and  offered, 
to  a  lover  of  the  moral  picturesque,  one  of  the  most  striking 
objects  at  the  Louth  election.  He  marched,  in  company  with 
the  doctor,  as  second  standard-bearer  to  Mr.  Dawson,  and  was 
as  unwearied  as  his  brother  patriot  in  this  his  new,  and,  if  we 
could  judge  from  his  shouts  and  exclamations,  his  delightful 
vocation. 

But  in  drawing  the  figures  and  detailing  the  incidents  by 
which  Mr.  Foster  was  surrounded,  I  allow  him,  perhaps,  to 
leave  the  foreground  of  the  picture.  As  the  election  advanced, 
his  fears  augmented,  and  he  presented  new  phenomena  of  ter- 
ror. His  opponents  felt  a  malevolent  pleasure  in  watching  the 
torture  which  he  was  undergoing,  and  in  observing  the  writhings 
of  the  mind,  which  were  apparent  in  his  demeanor  and  coun- 
tenance. But  Alexander  Dawson  had  in  a  few^  days  ceased 
to  be  the  immediate  object  of  his  competition;  for  the  latter 


LOtJTH    ELECTION.  245 

having  obtained  a  vast  majority,  Lis  return  was  no  longer  mat- 
ter of  speculation,  and  the  fiercest  contest  was  carried  on  be- 
tween the  Roden  and  the  Oriel  candidates,  who  had  originally 
entered  in  alliance  into  the  field.  Though  they  agreed  in  all 
political  opinions,  they  afforded  proof  of  the  promptitude  with 
which  abstract  questions  are  lost  in  individual  interests.  The 
Catholics  had  carried  Mr.  Dawson's  election,  and  Mr.  Foster 
and  his  friends  used  all  their  efforts  to  induce  them  to  remain 
neutral;  observing  that  Mr.  Foster  (which  was  a  just  remark) 
was  not  personally  obnoxious,  that  he  was  a  good  landlord,  and 
that  Lord  Roden's  candidate  was  not  only  politically  but  fa- 
natically opposed  to  them. 

These  arguments  had  their  weight  with  the  liberal  party 
although  the  more  sagacious  saw  that  it  would  be  a  consum- 
mation of  their  victory,  if  they  could  eject  from  the  House  of 
Commons  an  individual  who  had  contributed  some  talent  and 
a  great  deal  of  research  and  industry  to  the  maintenance  of  his 
party.  Still,  the  antipathy  to  Lord  Roden  prevailed  :  and  the 
detestation  in  which  his  wild,  lugubrious  doctrines  were  held  ; 
the  recollection  of  his  having  refused  a  small  piece  of  ground 
to  erect  a  more  commodious  house  of  Catholic  worship ;  his 
penurious  piety  ;  his  omission,  with  all  his  ostentatious  Chris- 
tianity, to  subscribe  to  a  single  charitable  institution  at  Dun- 
dalk;  and  other  circumstances  of  a  similar  character — made 
the  majority  of  the  people  rather  inclined  toward  Leslie  Foster 
than  to  the  candidate  by  which  the  Roden  interest  was  rep- 
resented. Mr.  Fortescue  had  now  abundant  reason  to  regret 
the  fastidious  spirit  with  which  a  tender  of  Catholic  support 
had  been  originally  rejected. 

Almost  all  the  county  had  been  polled  out,  and  then,  but 
when  it  was  too  late,  it  was  communicated  to  tire  Catholics, 
but  not  through  the  ostensible  agent  of  Mr.  Fortescue,  that 
their  assistance  was  necessary  to  throw  Mr.  Foster  out.  Had 
this  application  been  made  the  day  before,  the  Catholics,  who 
were  three  hundred  ahead  of  the  Protestant  candidates,  might 
have  interfered  with  effect.  Their  committee  refused  to  act; 
but  individuals  took  upon  themselves  to  gather  as  many  strag- 
gling freeholders  as  could  be  collected.     It  is  a  rule  that,  after 


246  JOftN   LESLIE  FOSTER. 

a  certain  number  of  days,  if  twenty  persons  do  not  poll  before 
six  o'clock,  the  booth  where  this  deficiency  takes  place  shall 
close.  Every  booth,  excepting  one,  was  shut  about  four  o'clock ; 
and  if  the  Roden  party  could  contrive  to  poll  twenty  before 
six,  they  would  have  been  entitled  to  hold  the  booth  open. 
They  calculated  that  on  the  next  day  they  could  bring  in 
enough  of  voters  to  obtain  a  majority,  with  the  aid  of  such  of 
the  Catholics  as  did  not  hate  Lord  Roden  less,  but  dreaded 
Leslie  Foster  more,  and  on  that  principle  were  doing  their  ut- 
most to  throw  him  out  of  Parliament.  About  four  o'clock, 
Leslie  Foster  had  a  majority  of  nine  or  ten,  and  I  believe  all 
his  votes  were  exhausted.  Some  twelve  or  thirteen  persons 
had  polled  in  the  booth  in  question  ;  and  if  Mr.  Fortescue  could 
procure  so  many  persons  merely  to  poll,  as  would,  with  the 
votes  already  given,  make  up  twenty,  his  object  would  have 
been  secured.  The  issue  of  the  contest,  therefore,  depended 
upon  minutes. 

The  booth  presented  a  most  singular  scene.  It  was  crowded 
to  excess,  from  the  condensation  of  the  public  interests  within 
its  narrow  limits.  Scarcely  space  enough  was  left  for  the  ad- 
mission of  the  voters;  and,  indeed,  it  was  the  object  of  the 
Foster  faction  to  retard  and  obstruct  their  arrival  by  every 
possible  expedient.  In  order  to  consume  time,  fellows  were 
put  up  on  Mr.  Foster's  tallies  who  had  no  votes ;  and  their  re- 
jection, and  the  clamor  and  confusion  which  it  produced,  served 
to  consume  the  hour,  of  which  every  instant  was  of  value.  Mr. 
Fortescue's  party  still  contrived  to  poll  a  few  freeholders,  who 
were  supplied  by  the  Catholics  ;  and  it  was  matter  of  great 
doubt  whether  the  important  and  decisive  number  "twenty" 
could  be  produced.  After  five  o'clock,  the  suspense  of  all  par- 
ties became  increased,  and  every  eye  was  alternately  turned 
to  the  spot  where  the  freeholders  were  polled,  and  to  the 
watches  which  were  held  in  the  hands  of  the  spectators,  and 
which  indicated  the  progress  of  time  to  that  point  on  which  the 
issue  was  to  hang.  I  never  saw  a  deeper  expression  of  solici- 
tude. Mr.  Fortescue  himself  was  not  there,  as  he  was  confined 
by  the  gout;  but  his  partisans  showed  an  anxiety  as  great  as 
if  personally  engaged  by  individual  interest  in  the  event. 


lotrra  election.  24? 

The  friends  of  Mr.  Foster,  who  were   gathered  round   the 
Sheriff,  manifested,  if  possible,  a  still  greater  intentness  of  ex- 
pectation.    George  Pentland,  who  had  been  long  solicitor  to 
the   customhouse,   of  which   Mr.  Foster  was,   since   1818,  the 
counsel,  acted  as  his  agent,  with  an   alacrity  which  inveterate 
habits  of  professional  sympathy  had  naturally  produced.    Many 
reciprocal  obligations  had  endeared  the  counsel  and  the  attor- 
ney to  each  other;  and  it  would  be  difficult,  perhaps,  to  adjust 
the  balance  of  gratitude,  and  to  determine  on  which   side  the 
golden  scale  ought  to  incline.     Certain  it  is  that  Mr.  Pentland 
exhibited  upon  this  occasion,  for  a  gentleman  who  was  alter- 
nately his  patron  and  his  protege,  the  most  ardent  sympathy. 
During  the  earlier  period  of  the  election,  George  had  preserved 
that  spirit  of  coaxing  good-humor,  and    of  humbug  urbanity, 
which  belongs  to  the  good  old  school  of  Irish  pensioners  and 
placemen.     "  Oh,  my  good  friend,"  George  used  to  say  (laying 
his  customhouse  gripe  upon  your  shoulder,  and  refusing  you  a 
permit  to  pass),  "you  little  know  Leslie  Foster.     Mind  what  I 
say,  and  I  have  an  eye  in  my  head,  Leslie  will  be  found  voting 
for  you  yet  —  mind"  —  (and  then  he  would  let  loose  your  shoul- 
der, while  he  placed  his  forefinger  on  the  tip  of  his  nose,  and 
winked  sagaciously  at  you)  —  "mind  what  I  say  —  but  I  say 
nothing — mum's  the  word  !"     But  George  laid   aside  all  his 
intimations,  whether  verbal,  physiognomical,  ocular,  or  nasal, 
as  the  fatal  hour  of  six   drew  on  ;   and  with  eyes  glaring  with 
expectation,  and  his  brows  raised  in  Saxon  arches  on  his  fore- 
head, he  sat  waiting  the  eventful  instant.     Near  him  stood  Mr. 
North,  whose  naturally  sweet  and  placid  countenance,  without 
exhibiting  the  fierceness  of  faction,  assumed  for  a  moment  an 
aspect  of  acerbity,  while  his  lips,  that  were  as  white  as  ashes, 
trembled  and   quivered  in  the  expression   of  the  few  words  to 
which  he  occasionally  gave  utterance. 

But  where  was  Leslie  Foster  all  this  time?  This  question, 
which  the  reader  will  probably  ask,  I  put  to  myself;  and,  on 
turning  my  eyes  round,  I  was  at  first  at  a  loss  to  discover  him. 
At  length  I  observed  a.  person  sitting  in  a  remote  corner  of  the 
room,  upon  a  chair  which  was  thrown  back  in  such  a  way  that 
it  was  balanced  on  two  legs,  while  the  head  of  the  somewhat 


248  JOHN    LESLIE   FOSTE&. 

round  and  squat  gentleman  by  whom  it  was  occupied  leaned 
against  the  wall.  His  hat  was  drawn  over  his  brows,  and  his 
eyes  were  closed.  His  cheeks,  which  seemed  to  have  been 
originally  full  and  plentiful,  appeared  to  have  suffered  a  cadav- 
erous collapse.  Thick  drops  of  perspiration  trickled  down  his 
visage,  which  he  occasionally  wiped  away  with  an  Orange 
handkerchief  held  in  his  right  hand  ;  while  a  watch,  on  which, 
however,  he  did  not  look,  was  in  the  other.  I  did  not  at  first 
recognise  this  extraordinary  figure;  but  upon  a  sudden  it 
started  up,  and  on  the  opening  of  the  eyes,  and  the  full  dis- 
closure of  the  countenance,  I  thought  I  could  perceive  some 
faint  resemblance  to  Leslie  Foster.  He  seemed,  at  first,  to 
stand  in  an  attitude  of  cataleptic  horror ;  and  when  he  recov- 
ered himself,  he  clasped  his  hands,  and,  unable  to  sustain  his 
agony,  rushed  with  a  frantic  speed  out  of  the  room.  He  had 
given  everything  up  for  lost;  but  he  was  mistaken.  The 
twenty  votes  had  not  been  made  up.  The  clock  struck  six, 
and  John  Leslie  Foster  was  saved  from  being  buried  by  torch- 
light [as  a  suicide],  under  the  new  act  of  Parliament,  in  the 
churchyard  of  Dundalk. 

Mr.  Dawson  and  Mr.  Foster  were  returned  as  duly  elected. 
The  latter  did  not  attend  at  the  hustings  when  the  event  of 
the  election  was  proclaimed.  He  set  off  for  Cullen,  the  seat 
of  Lord  Oriel,  in  that  heaving  and  agitation  of  mind  which  the 
stormy  passions  leave  behind,  after  the  immediate  occasion  of 
their  excitement  has  ceased  to  act.  His  flight  was  considered 
as  most  inglorious,  and  it  was  boasted  by  the  Catholic  orators 
that  he  did  not  dare  to  meet  them.  This  was  a  great  disap- 
pointment to  Mr.  Sheil  and  other  dealers  in  harangue,  who  ex- 
pected to  show  off  at  his  expense.  He  very  wisely  effected  his 
retreat  to  his  uncle's  (the  late  Lord  Oriel's)  residence,  whose 
octogenarian  philosophy  did  not  prevent  him  from  feeling  a 
deep  and  corroding  interest  in  the  event.  Had  Mr.  Foster 
remained  sequestered  in  the  beautiful  Avoods  which  the  Speaker 
of  the  Irish  House  of  Commons  lived  to  see  rise  about  him, 
he  would  have  acted  wisely.*     But,  after  a  short  interval,  the 

*  When  the  Union  was  passed,  John  Foster  was  Speaker  of  the  House  of 
Commons.     He  was  Mr.  Leslie  Foster's  uncle,  and  was  raised  to  the  peerager 


COST   OF   CREATING   A   PEER.  CA9 

public  were  astonished  by  a  resentful  lucubration  from  his  ren, 
in  which  .he  vilified  the  proceedings  of  the  Catholics,  and  in- 
veighed with  great  virulence  against  the  priests.  If  ever  he 
stands  for  the  county  of  Louth  again,  which  is  very  improbable, 
this  document  will  be  brought  in  judgment  against  him. 

He  was  guilty  of  another  indiscretion,  or  rather  a  piece  of 
bad  taste,  as  it  was  far  more  deserving  of  laughter  than  of 
condemnation.  Having  fled  from  Dundalk,  where  Mr.  Daw- 
son was  chaired,  he  caused  himself  to  be  put  through  a  similar 

by  the  title  of  Lord  Oriel. — I  have  so  repeatedly  had  occasion  to  refer  to  the 
creation  of  peers,  that  it  may  not  be  out  of  place  to  say  something'  about  the  cost 
("  surget  amari  aliquid"),  which  is  considerable  and  is  defrayed  by  the  person 
who  receives  the  elevation,  except  when  the  dignity  is  conferred  for  public 
services,  when  the  amount  is  paid  out  of  the    sum  granted  by  Parliament  for 
Civil  Contingencies.     In   1853,  on  the  motion  of  Mr.  Hume,  who  always  de- 
sires to  know  how  the  public  money  is  expended,  a  Parliamentary  return  was 
printed,  of  the  persons  to  whom,  and  for  what  services,  the  sum  of  four  hun- 
dred and  twenty  pounds  sterling,  charged  in  the  Civil  Contingencies  for  1852, 
was  paid,  and  the  names  of  the  several  persons  receiving  the  same  for  the  pat- 
ent creating  General  Lord  Fitzroy  Somerset  a  baron  of  the  United  Kingdom. 
He  had  been  Military  Secretary,  for  a  long  period,  to  the  Duke  of  Wellington 
when  Commander-in-chief,  and,  on  the  Duke's  death,  in  September,  1852,  was 
appointed  Master-General  of  the  Ordnance,  and  called  to  the  Upper  House  as 
Baron  Raglan.     It  appears,  by  the  official  return,  that,  in  the  expenses  of  his 
patent  of  nobility,  the  crown-office  charges  amounted  to  £390,  15s.  Ad.',  and 
the  authon'ty  for  the  same  is  stated  "  ancient  usages."     Of  that  sum,  £150,  2s. 
went  to  the  Stamp-office;  £104,  6s.  \Qd.  to  the  royal  household.     Some  of  the 
items  are  curious.     The  payment  to  the  Lord  Chancellor,  Great  Seal  fee,  is  £2, 
6s.  8d. ;  the  clerk  of  the  Hanaper,  has  £24,  13s.  Ad. ;  the  deputy,  £l,  Is. ;  the 
Lord-Chancellor's  purse-bearer,  has   £5,  5s. ;    the   porter  to  the  Great  Seal, 
£l,  Is.:  gentlemen  to  ditto,  £6;  sealer,   £1,  2s.  6d. ;  deputy  ditto,  10s.  6d. 
Chaffwax,  £l,  2s.  *2d. ;  deputy  ditto,   10s.  6d. ;  principal   Usher  of  Scotland, 
£6,  13s.  6d.;  Scotch  heralds,  £16;    English  ditto,  £36  ;    Earl-Marshal,  £5  ; 
Garter-King-at-Arms,  £20;  and  the  gold-emblazoned  skin  and  boxes  to  hold 
the  patent  and  seal,  cost  £9.     The  Patent-office  charges  amounted  to  £29, 
18s.  6d.     By  the  Attorney-General,  £20,   for  approving,  settling,  and  signing 
the  Queen's  warrant  for  Her  Majesty's  signature,  according  to  "  ancient  usage." 
By  the  clerk  of  the  Patents,  to  the  Attorney-General,  £7,  7s.  6d.,  by  ancient 
usage,  and  £l,  10s.  stamp  duty  on  warrant.     By  the  engrossing  clerk,  £l, 
1».,  for    engrossing  the  warrant  and   for   parchment.     In  this    manner   £420 
was  expended  in  the  creation  of  a  baron  of  the  United  Kingdom.     The  higher 
the  rank  conferred,  the  heavier  the  charge?.     It  is  understood  that  the  cost  of  a 
Duke's  patent  is  nearly  four  thousand  pounds  sterling. —  M. 

11* 


250  JOEtt   LESLIE   FOSfEft. 

honor  in  his  uncle's  demesne.  All  the  vassals  and  retained 
of  Lord  Oriel,  who  could  be  procured,  were  collected-together, 
and  Mr.  Foster  having  been  placed  upon  the  shoulders  of  four 
stout  Protestant  tenants,  was  conveyed  through  the  village  of 
Cullen,  amid  the  plaudits  of  the  yeomanry,  the  hurrahs  of  the 
schoolmaster,  the  sexton,  and  the  parish-clerk,  and  the  accla- 
mations of  the  police. 

I  have  hitherto  considered  Mr.  Foster  as  a  candidate,  and  I 
should  give  an  equally  minute  account  of  him  as  a  member  of 
Parliament,  but  that  I  have  not  had  the  same  fortunate  oppor- 
tunities of  observation.  I  do,  indeed,  remember  an  incident, 
which  may  be  considered,  to  a  certain  extent,  illustrative  of 
his  influence  as  a  legislative  speaker;  and,  in  the  lack  of  any 
other  means  of  describing  him,  it  may  not  be  inappropriate  to 
set  it  down. 

I  was  under  the  gallery  of  the  House  of  Commons  during 
the  debate  on  the  Catholic  question,  in  the  year  1825.  The 
House  was  exceedingly  full.  Mr.  Foster  rose  to  speak,  and 
the  effect  of  his  appearance  on  his  legs  was  truly  wonderful. 
In  an  instant  the  House  was  cleared.  The  rush  to  the  door 
leading  to  the  tavern  up  stairs,  where  the  members  find  a  refuge 
from  the  soporific  powers  of  their  brother-legislators,  was  tre- 
mendous. I  was  myself  swept  away  by  the  torrent,  and  car- 
ried from  my  place  by  the  crowd,  that  fled  from  the  solemn 
adjuration  with  Avhich  Mr.  Foster  commenced  his  oration.  The 
single  phrase  "  Mr.  Speaker"  was  indeed  uttered  with  such  a 
tone  as  indicated  the  extent  of  the  impending  evil;  and  find- 
ing already  the  influence  of  drowsiness  upon  me,  I  followed 
the  example  which  was  given  by  the  representatives  of  the 
people,  who,  whatever  differences  may  have  existed  among 
them  upon  the  mode  of  settling  Ireland,  appeared  to  coincide 
in  their  estimate  of  Mr.  Foster's  elocution.  From  the  Treasury 
benches,  the  opposition  and  the  neutral  quarters  of  the  House, 
a  simultaneous  concourse  hurried  up  to  Bellamy's,  and  left  Mr. 
Foster  in  full  possession  of  that  solitude  which  he  had  thus 
instantaneously  and  miraculously  produced. 

I  proceeded  up  stairs  with  some  hundreds  of  honorable  gen- 
tlemen.    The  scene  which  Bellamy's  presents  to  a  stranger  is 


iffOBILITY    IN    "THE   COMMONS."  251 

striking  enough.  Two  smart  girls,  whose  briskness  and  neat 
attire  made  up  for  their  want  of  beauty,  and  for  the  invasions 
of  time,  of  which  their  cheeks  showed  the  traces,  helped  out 
tea  in  a  room  in  the  corridor.  It  Avas  pleasant  to  observe  the 
sons  of  Dukes  and  Marquises,*  and  the  possessors  of  twenties 
and  thirties  of  thousands  a  year,  gathered  round  these  dam- 
sels, and  soliciting  a  cup  of  that  beverage  which  it  was  their 
office  to  administer.  These  Bellamy  bar-maids  seemed  so  fa- 
miliarized with  tlieir  occupation,  that  they  went  through  it  with 

*  The  sons  of  the  nobility  are  eligible  to  sit  in  the  House  of  Commons, 
though  it  is  an  anomaly  for  persons  belonging  to  the  Aristocracy,  by  feeling 
and  interest,  as  well  as  by  birth,  to  be  nominal  representatives  of  the  People. 
Irish  peers  may  also  be  members  of  the  House  of  Commons  —  but  not  for  an 
Irish  county  or  borough.  Thus  Earl  Annesley  represents  Great  Grimsby,  in 
Lincolnshire,  and  Viscount  Palmerston  is  member  for  Tiverton,  in  Devonshire. 
The  eldest  sons  of  Dukes,  Marquises,  and  Earls,  bear,  by  courtesy,  the  second 
titles  of  their  fathers.  Thus  the  Duke  of  Leinster's  eldest  son  is  called  Mar 
quis  of  Kildare:  the  Marquis  of  Westminster's  is  Eurl  of  Grosvenor:  the  Eail 
of  Lichfield's  is  Viscount  Anson.  In  some  few  cases,  the  holder  of  a  peerage 
has  not  also  l-eceived  the  rank  immediately  below  his  own.  Thus,  the  Duke 
of  Manchester's  second  title  is  only  Viscount  Mandeville.  The  issue  of  ji  trior 
children  of  Dukes,  Marquises,  and  Earls,  have  respectively  the  title  of  "  Lord" 
or  "Lady"  prefixed  to  their  name  —  so  we  have  Lord  John  Russell,  Lady 
Blanche  Gower.  The  eldest  son  of  a  Viscount  or  a  Baron  is  plainly  "  The 
Honorable" — thus,  Viscount  Strangford's  eldest  son  is  "  The  Honorable  George 
Smythe,"  and  his  brothers  and  sisters  would  be  entitled  to  the  same  prefix, 
which  is  confined  only  to  the  nobility  —  not  even  a  Baronet  being  entitled  to  it. 
A  member  of  Parliament,  spoken  of  in  Parliament  as  "  the  honorable  membei 
for  so-and-so,"  has  no  distinctive  appellation  out  of  it.  Therefore  we  b<ive 
plain  Mr.  Cobden  ;  but  when  a  man  is  a  Privy  Councillor,  he  has  a  permanent 
title  —  such  as  "The  Right  Honorable  Benjamin  Disraeli."  Every  peer  is 
"  right  honorable."  Courtesy  titles  are  not  recognised  by  law.  Thus,  if  the 
late  Duke  of  Wellington's  eldest  son,  or  the  Duke  of  Bedford's  brother  were  to 
be  named  in  the  London  Gazette,  as  having  obtained  any  appointment,  the 
description  would  be  "  the  honorable  Arthur  Wellesley,  commonly  called  Mar- 
quis of  Douro,"  or  "the  honorable  John  Russell,  commonly  called  Lord  John 
Russell." — The  House  of  Commons  consists  of  658  members,  and  I  find,  on 
carefully  going  over  the  list,  that  228  of  these  belong  to  tbe  nobility  by  birth  or 
marriage.  That  is,  more  than  one  third  of  the  representatives  of  the  Commons 
of  the  United  Kingdom  actually  are  members  of  the  Aristocracy,  the  natural  op- 
ponents of  popular  privileges  and  rights.  The  eventual  remedy  will  be,  to 
effect  a  reform  by  which  peers'  sons  shall  be  disqualified  from  sitting  in  'die 
Cpir-jnons  House  of  Parliament. —  IVf,    . 


252  JOHN    LESLIE   FOSTER. 

perfect  nonchalance,  and  would  occasionally  turn  with  petu- 
lance, in  which  they  asserted  the  superiority  of  their  sex  to 
rank  and  opulence,  from  the  noble  or  wealthy  suitors  for  a 
draught  of  tea,  by  whom  they  were  surrounded.  The  unfortu- 
nate Irish  members  were  treated  with  a  peculiar  disdain,  and 
were  reminded  of  their  provinciality  by  the  look  of  these  Par- 
liamentary Hebes,  who  treated  them  as  mere  colonial  deputies 
should  be  received  in  the  purlieus  of  the  state. 

I  passed  from  these  ante-eh ambers  to  the  tavern,  where  I 
found  a  number  of  members  assembled  at  dinner.  Half  an 
hour  had  passed  away,  toothpicks  and  claret  wrere  now  begin- 
ning to  appear,  and  the  business  of  mastication  being  con- 
cluded, that  of  digestion  had  commenced,  and  many  an  honor- 
able gentleman,  I  observed,  who  seemed  to  prove  that  he  was 
born  only  to  digest.  At  the  end  of  a  long  corridor,  which 
opened  from  the  room  where  the  diners  were  assembled,  there 
stood  a  waiter  whose  office  it  was  to  inform  any  interrogator 
what  gentleman  was  speaking  below  stairs.  Nearly  opposite 
the  door  sat  two  English  county  members.  They  had  disposed 
of  a  bottle  each,  and,  just  as  the  last  glass  was  emptied,  one  of 
them  called  out  to  the  annunciator  at  the  end  of  the  passage 
for  intelligence.  "  Mr.  Foster  on  his  legs  !"  was  the  formida- 
ble answer.  "  Waiter,  bring  another  bottle  !"  was  the  imme- 
diate effect  of  this  information,  which  was  followed  by  a  simi- 
lar injunction  from  every  table  in  the  room.  I  perceived  that 
Mr.  Bellamy  owed  great  obligations  to  Mr.  Foster.  But  the 
latter  did  not  limit  himself  to  a  second  bottle;  again  and  again 
the  same  questiou  was  asked,  and  again  the  same  announce- 
ment returned  —  "Mr.  Foster  upon  his  legs!"  The  answer 
seemed  to  fasten  men  in  inseparable  adhesiveness  to  their  seats 
Thus  two  hours  went  by  —  when,  at  length,  "Mr.  Plunket  on 
his  legs,"  was  heard  from  the  end  of  the  passage,  and  the  whole 
convocation  of  compotators  rose  together  and  returned  to  the 
House. 

Some  estimate  of  the  eloquence  of  Mr.  Foster  may  be  formed 
from  this  evidence  of  its  effects.  I  am  unable  myself  to  supply, 
from  personal  observation,  any  better  detail  of  it.  But  it  is 
]r»ot  necessary  :  Mr.  Plunket,  in  a  single  phrase,  has  describe^ 


HIS    OPIATE    OEATOKT.  253 

Ins  legislative  faculties,  and  on  the  night  of  which  I  have  been 
speaking  remarked  that  "he  had  turned  history  into  an  old 
almanac."  I  should  not  omit  to  mention,  in  justice  to  Mr.  Fos- 
ter, that  in  converting  the  annals  of  mankind  to  this  valuable 
purpose,  he  exhibits  a  wonderful  diligence.  His  speeches  are 
the  result  of  great  industry,  and  he  takes  care  not  to  deliver 
himself  of  any  crude,  abortive  notions,  such  as  are  thrown  off 
in  extempore  debate;  but,  after  allowing  his  meditations  to 
mature  in  a  due  process  of  conception  in  his  mind,  brings  them 
forth  with  a  laborious  effort,  and  presents  his  intellectual  off- 
spring to  the  House  in  the  "swaddling"  phraseology  in  which 
they  are  always  carefully  wrapped  up. 

It  was,  indeed,  at  one  time  believed  and  studiously  propa- 
gated by  his  friends,  that  he  did  not  prepare  his  orations,  and 
that  he  poured  out  his  useless  erudition,  and  his  mystical  dog- 
mas, without  premeditation  or  research.  That  erroneous  con- 
jecture has  been  recently  corrected;  for,  upon  a  late  occasion, 
when  the  Chaplain  of  the  House  of  Commons  was  reading 
prayers,  at  four  o'clock,  Mr.  Foster,  who  appeared  to  those  at 
a  distance  to  be  kneeling  in  a  posture  of  profound  Parliament- 
ary piety,  with  his  hands  raised,  as  is  the  fashion  with  the 
devout,  to  his  lips,  was  heard  to  mutter  through  his  fingers: 
"Had  it  been  my  good  fortune,  Mr.  Speaker,  to  have  caught 
your  eye  at  an  earlier  period  of  the  debate,  I  should  have  gone 
more  at  length,  than  I  now,  at  this  late  hour  of  the  night,  in- 
tend to  do,  into  the  details  of  a  question,  upon  which  the  integ- 
rity of  the  constitution,  the  sacred  privileges^of  the  Protestants 
of  Ireland,  and  the  purity  of  the  reformed  religion,  entirely 
depend."  Mr.  Richard  Martin,  the  then  member  for  Conna- 
mara,  who  happened  to  hear  Mr.  Foster,  communicated  this 
important  discovery;  and  it  is  now  well  ascertained  that 
Mr.  Foster  takes  exceedingly  great  if  not  very  meritorious 
pains  at  his  oratorical  laboratory,  and  passes  many  a  mid 
night  vigil  in  compounding  those  opiates  with  which,  at  the 
expense  of  his  own  slumbers,  he  lulls  the  House  of  Commons 
to  repose. 

Mr.  Foster  may  be  considered  in  the  various  phases  of  bar- 
rister, scholar,  commissioner  of  education,  and  counsel  to  the 


254  JOHN    LESLIE    FOSTER. 

commissioners  of  customs  and  excise.*  As  a  member  of  the 
bar,  he  is  not  very  remarkable.  He  is  not  in  considerable 
business,  which  I  am  inclined  to  attribute  to  his  dedication  of 
himself  to  political  pursuits ;  for  he  came  to  the  profession  un- 
der great  advantages,  having  industry,  a  tenacious  memory, 
and  the  patronage  of  the  late  Chief-Justice  Downes.  I  think 
that  he  would  have  succeeded  in  the  Court  of  Chancery,  had 
he  attended  exclusively  to  the  bar;  for  certainly  he  is  not  des- 
titute of  the  powers  of  clear  reasoning  and  perspicuous  exposi- 
tion. His  great  fault  is,  that  he  diffuses  an  air  of  importance 
over  all  that  he  says,  looks,  and  does,  which  is  not  unfrequently 
in  ludicrous  contrast  with  the  matter  before  him.  Instead  of 
speaking  trippingly  upon   the   tongue,  he  loads  his  utterance 

*  John  Leslie  Foster  was  grandson  of  Chief  Baron  Foster,  son  of  Dr.  Foster, 
Bishop  of  Clogher  (who  died  in  1787),  and  nephew  to  John  Foster,  Speaker 
of  the  Irish  House  of  Commons,  who  was  raised  to  the  peerage  as  Lord  Oriel. 
Without  doubt,  Mr.  Leslie  Foster  took  double  pains  to  become  a  lawyer,  for 
though  called  to  the  Irish  bar  in  1803,  he  had  previously  been  admitted,  by 
the  Society  of  Lincoln's  Inn,  in  London,  to  the  English  bar  also.  In  1804,  he 
published  a  book  "  On  the  Principles  of  Commercial  Exchanges."  He  was 
industrious,  besides  being  connected  with  the  nobility  by  relationship  and  mar- 
riage, and  got  on  in  his  profession.  He  was  successively  appointed  Commis- 
sioner of  Education  (salary  twelve  hundred  pounds  sterling  a  year)  and  counsel 
to  the  Commissioners  of  Customs  and  Excise  —  the  average  annual  income  of 
which,  from  1818,  when  he  entered  into  the  office,  until  1828  (when  he  re- 
ceived as  "  compensation,"  two  thousand  pounds  sterling  for  life)  was  three 
thousand  seven  hundred  and  thirty  pounds  sterling.  Therefore  these  two  ap- 
pointments, the  duties  of  which  were  neither  onerous  nor  troublesome,  gave 
him  about  five  thousand  pounds  sterling  a  year,  besides  the  collateral  business 
coming  to  him,  from  the  position  he  had  thus  obtained  ;  whatever  other  phe- 
nomenon marked  his  birth,  Leslie  Foster  did  not  come  into  the  world  with  a 
wooden  spoon  in  his  mouth.  His  politics  were  intensely  Tory,  and  recommen- 
ded him  to  Trinity  College,  Dublin,  as  a"  marvellous  proper  man"  to  represent 
its  intolerance  in  Parliament.  His  maiden  speech  was  delivered  in  April,  1812, 
in  opposition  to  Grattan's  motion  against  the  Penal  Laws,  and  he  published  it  in 
a  pamphlet.  In  Parliament,  from  first  to  last,  he  was  consistent  —  in  resisting 
liberal  measures,  no  matter  by  whom  introduced.  In  July,  1830,  the  Duke  of 
Wellington  made  him  one  of  the  Barons  of  the  Court  of  Exchequer  in  Ireland. 
He  was  a  laborious  judge,  and  little  more  can  be  said  of  him  in  that  capacity. 
In  1842,  he  was  transferred  to  the  Court  of  Common  Pleas.  He  went  the 
summer  Assize,  in  1842,  and  dined,  apparently  in  good  health,  with  the  Sheriff 
and  Magistrates  at  Cavan,  but  was  suddenly  taken  ill,  had  time  to  execute  a 
pnd.ipil  to  his  will,  and  expired,  July  10,  1842.     H"   lied  immensely  rich.—  JVf 


MARQUIS   OF   ANGLESEY.  255 

with  an  immense  weight  of  intonation,  and  is  not  more  ponder- 
ous and  oracular  in  Parliament  than  at  the  har.  That  gravity, 
which  Rochefoucauld  has  so  well  called  "  a  mystery  of  the 
body,"  pervades  his  gesture,  and  sits  in  eternal  repose  upon  his 
countenance.  He  advances  to  his  seat,  at  the  inner  bar,  like 
a  priest  walking  in  a  procession;  he  lays  down  his  bag  upon 
the  green  table  as  if  he  were  depositing  a  treasure;  ]ie  bows 
to  the  court  like  a  mandarin  before  the  Emperor  of  China ; 
quotes  Tidd's  Practice  as  a  Rabbi  would  read  the  Talmud  ; 
and  opens  the  "Rules  and  Orders"  as  a  sorcerer  would  unclasp 
a  book  of  incantation. 

The  solemnity  which  distinguishes  him  in  Court,  attends 
him  out  of  it.  He  traverses  the  Hall  with  a  gait  and  aspect 
of  mystical  meditation;  and  when  he  has  divested  himself  of 
his  forensic  habiliments,  still  takes  care  to  retain  his  walk  of 
egregious  dignity  upon  his  return  to  Merrion-square.  Mr.  Fos- 
ter has  ascertained,  with  exact  precision,  the  distance  from  his 
house  to  the  Hall  of  the  Four  Courts ;  and  has  counted  the 
number  of  paces  which  it  is  requisite  that  he  should  perform, 
whether  he  should  go  through  College  Green  or  by  any  of  the 
lanes  at  the  back  of  Dublin  Castle.  Both  these  ways  have 
their  attractions.  In  the  centre  of  College  Green  stands  the 
statue  of  King  William,  on  which  Mr.  Foster  sometimes  pauses 
to  cast  a  look,  in  which,  of  late,  some  melancholy  has  been 
observed.  The  purlieus  of  the  Castle  are,  however,  his  more 
favorite,  and  perhaps  appropriate  walks,  especially  since  the 
order  for  Lord  Anglesey's  removal  has  arrived.*     But,  which- 

*  The  Marquis  of  Anglesey,  who  was  bom  in  1768,  was  eldest  son  of  the 
late  Earl  of  Uxbridge,  and,  after  studying  at  Oxford,  was  appointed,  in  1793, 
when  Lord  Paget,  to  the  command  of  a  regiment  he  had  raised  among  his 
father's  tenantry.  He  served  with  this  corps,  under  the  Duke  of  York,  in 
Flanders,  and  again  in  the  expedition  to  Holland,  in  1799.  He  had  risen  to 
the  rank  of  Major-General  when  he  joined  Sir  John  Moore's  army  in  the  Penin- 
sula, and  assisted  in  the  retreat  of  Corunna,  and  the  battle  there,  January  16, 
1809,  where  Moore  was  killed.  He  was  married,  in  1795,  to  a  daughter  of 
the  Earl  of  Jersey,  by  whom  he  had  eight  children,  but,  soon  after  his  return 
from  Portugal  figured  as  defendant  in  a  crim.  con.  suit,  in  which  the  plaintiff 
was  Mr.  Henry  Wellesley  (brother  to  "  The  Duke,"  and  created  Lord  Cowley, 
in  3828),  who  obtained  twenty  thousand  pounds  sterling,  damages.  The  re- 
sult was  a  double  divoxxe:  Lady  Paget  from  him  (she  afterward  married  the 


256  JOHN    LESLIE    FOSTER. 

ever  route  lie  adopts,  lie  never  deviates  from  that  evenness 
and  regularity  of  gait  with  which  he  originally  enumerated 
the  number  of  paces  from  his  residence  to  the  Hall. 

I  was  a  good  deal  at  a  loss  to  account  for  this  peculiar  demea- 
nor, until  I  had  heard  that  Mr.  Foster  had  spent  some  time 
at  Constantinople.  He  was  introduced,  upon  one  occasion, 
to  the  Grand  Seignior  (a  scene  which  he  describes  Avith  great 
particularity),  and  has  ever  since  retained  an  expression  of 
dignity,  which  it  is  supposed  he  copied  from  the  lleis  Effendi, 

late  Duke  of  Argyll),  and  Mr.  Wellesley  from  his  guilty  wife,  nee  Lady  Char- 
lotte Cadogan.  Lord  Paget  married  the  frail  fair,  in  1810,  and  they  had  a 
large  family;  two  of  their  sons  are  members  of  the  British  House  of  Commons 
now  [1854]. —  The  trial  and  its  revelations,  gave  much  unenviable  notoriety  to 
Lord  Paget.     He  was  alluded  to  by  Byron,  in  the  line, 

"  And,  worse  of  all,  a  Paget  for  your  wife. 

and  Moore  (albeit  Little  of  a  moralist),  thus  had  his  fling  in  a  didactic  poem. 

called  "  The  Skeptic,  a  philosophical  satire  :" — 

"  Paget,  who  sees,  upon  his  pillow  laid, 
A  face  for  which  ten  thousand  pounds  were  paid, 
Can  tell  how  quick,  before  a  jury,  flies 
The  spell  that  mocked  the  warm  seducer's  eyes." 

Many  years  subsequently,  when  he  had  become  viceroy,  the  Irish  ladies 
declined  visiting  his  wife,  and  having  caused  the  arrest  of  O'Connell,  on  a 
charge  of  seditious  language,  the  orator,  in  another  speech,  said,  "  He  has 
caused  my  wife  to  weep.  Does  he  know  the  value  of  a  virtuous  woman's  tear?" 
—  In  1812,  Lord  Paget  succeeded  his  father,  as  Earl  of  Uxbridge.  He  had  a 
cavalry  command  at  Waterloo,  and  having  there  lost  a  leg,  was  created  Marquis 
of  Anglesey.  In  1820,  he  voted  for  the  bill  of  pains  and  penalties  against  Queen 
Caroline.  In  February,  1828,  "  The  Duke,"'  who  had  just  became  Premier,  sent 
him  to  Ireland,  as  Viceroy,  and  his  conduct  there  was  generally  impartial.  But 
in  December,  1828,  having  received  a  letter  from  Dr.  Curtis  (the  Catholic  Pri- 
mate), which  the  Duke  of  Wellington  had  written  to  him,  suggesting  that  the 
Catholic  claims  be  "buried  in  oblivion"  for  a  time,  Lord  Anglesey  wrote  back 
an  epistle,  which  was  published,  recommending  the  continued  agitation  of  the 
question.  This  gave  great  offence  to  George  IV.,  who  had  become  tired  of 
eternal  discussions  on  Catholic  wrongs,  and  the  writer  was  recalled.  Two 
months  after,  the  final  settlement  of  the  question  was  recommended  in 
the  King's  Speech,  at  the  commencement  of  the  Parliamentary  Session.  Soon 
after,  he  was  again  made  Viceroy  of  Ireland,  and  so  continued  until  September, 
1833.  But  his  latter  reign  was  not  popular.  He  has  held  other  high  offices, 
connected  with  the  army,  and  is  the  senior  Field  Marshal  in  the  British  army. 
fte  is  now  (January,  1854)  m  his  eighty-sixth  year. —  M. 


HIS   PECULIAR   ERUDITION.  257 

if  not  from  the  Sultan  himself.  Hitherto  the  negotiations  with 
the  Porte"  have  been  unsuccessful.  If  Mr.  Foster  were  sent 
out  as  our  minister,  such  a  sympathetic  solemnity  would  take 
place  between  him  and  the  Grand  Vizier,  that  many  difficul- 
ties would,  it  is  likely,  be  got  rid  of;  and  he  would,  by  his 
Asiatic  diplomacy  of  countenance  and  his  Oriental  gravity  of 
look,  accomplish  far  more  than  Lord  Strangford*  was  able 
to  effect. 

As  a  scholar,  Mr.  Leslie  Foster  is,  beyond  all  doubt,  a  per- 
son of  very  various  and  minute  erudition.  In  every  drawing- 
room  and  at  every  dinner-table  at  which  he  appears,  amaze- 
ment is  produced  by  the  vastness  of  his  knowledge  ;  and  under- 
graduates from  the  College,  and  young  ladies  whose  stockings 
are  but  darned  with  blue  silk,  wonder  that  even  a  head  of 
such  great  diameter  should  be  capable  of  containing  such 
enormous  masses  of  the  most  recondite  and  diversified  lore.f 
The  President  of  the  Royal  Academy  of  Laputa,  or  the  father 
of  Martinus  Scriblerus,  could  not  have  surpassed  him  in  the 
character,  the  extent,  and  the  application  of  his  knowledge. 
No  matter  what  topics  may  be  presented  in  the  trivialities  of 
discourse,  he  avails  himself  of  every  opportunity  to  evacuate 
his  erudition.  He  buries  every  petty  subject  under  the  enor- 
mity of  his  learning,  and  piles  a  mountain  on  every  pigmy 
theme.  If  he  finds  a  boy  whipping  a  top,  he  stops  to  explain 
the  principles  upon  which  it  is  put  into  motion.  He  is  versed 
in  all  points  of  science  connected  with  the  playing  of  marbles. 
Should  a  pair  of  bellows  fall  in  his  way,  he  enters  into  a  dis- 

*  Viscount  Strangford,  in  the  Irish,  and  Baron  Penshurst,  in  the  British  peer- 
age, distinguished  himself  nearly  half  a  century  ago,  as  the  translator  of  Camoens, 
the  Portuguese  poet.  For  this,  he  was  duly  niched  and  pedestaled  by  Byron, 
in  "  English  Bards  and  Scotch  Reviewers.''1  He  was  born  in  1780,  and  is  yet 
alive  [1854]  :  he  has  been  Ambassador  to  Turkey,  Russia,  &c. —  His  son,  Mr. 
Smythe,  formerly  M.  P.  for  Canterbury,  has  written  some  pretty  verses,  is  a 
good  speaker,  and,  when  in  Parliament,  was  a  leader  of  the  Young  England 
party. —  M. 

t  If  the  quantity  of  brains  be  estimated  by  the  size  of  the  skull,  Mr.  Leslie 
Foster  ought  to  have  been  a  very  clever  man.  His  head  was  large,  out  of  all 
proportion,  and  had  a  curious  oscillating  motion,  more  peculiar  than  graceful 
—  something  like  the  vibration  of  a  Chinese  Mandarin's  image  in  a  grocer's 
window. —  M. 


258  JOHN    LESLIE    FOSTER. 

sertation  upon  the  structure  of  the  human  lungs ;  and  applies 
to  those  domestic  conveniences  of  which  there  is  such  a  want 
in  the  modern  Athens,  his  learning  in  hydraulics.*     In  short, 

*  Such  another  "Admirable  Crichton"  as  this,  was  to  be  found,  a  few  years 
ago,  in  the  person  of  the  late  Egerton  Smith,  for  many  years  editor  of  The 
Liverpool  Mercury,  in  England.  He  commenced  life  a*  a  spectacle-maker,  but 
had  small  skill  in  that  craft,  and  took  to  the  press.  He  spi'inkled  his  articles 
with  Greek  and  Latin  sentences,  rarely  applicable  to  the  subject,  and  apparently 
taken,  at  hap-hazard  from  some  Dictionary  of  Quotations.  In  a  previous  work 
of  mine,  his  character  is  sketched  in  full,  and  I  take  leave  to  reproduce  it  here. 

—  "He  bore  the  rather  uncommon  patronymic  of  Smith.  In  his  newspaper 
he  was  chiefly  distinguished  by  reason  of  the  number  of  hobbies  which  he  rode. 
His  original  occupation  of  optician  gave  him  a  certain  mechanical  facility  in 
making  toys  —  puzzles  for  tbe  curious  and  the  idle.  Asserting  that  he  was  one 
of  the  best  swimmers  in  the  world,  his  delight  was  to  exhibit  himself  in  the 
Mersey,  floundering  like  a  porpoise,  and  confident  that  the  feats  of  Leandcr 
and  Byron  were  trifling  in  comparison  with  his  own.  Avowing  the  most  phil- 
anthropic motives,  he  invented  cork-jackets  to  prevent  death  by  drowning,  and 

—  sold  them  at  a  large  profit.  He  contended  that  the  boomei-ang  of  New  South 
Wales  was  a  weapon  worthy  of  being  universally  adopted  in  European  warfare, 
aud  spent  a  whole  summer  in  throwing  this  projectile  into  the  air,  to  ascertain 
its  force,  and  perfect  his  own  skill.  But  the  triumph  of  his  experiments  and 
discoveries  in  science,  and  that  on  which  he  chit  fly  prided  himself,  was  to 
show  that  a  top  (such  as  children  of  a  lesser  growth  are  accustomed  to  whip, 
in  play),  might  be  kept  spinning  for  half  an  hour  upon  a  china  plate.  During 
a  series  of  years,  he  kept  this  subject  before  the  public,  in  his  newspaper,  de- 
voting columns  to  its  elucidations,  and  adorning  them  with  diagrams  and  wood 
cuts,  showing  the  course  of  the  spinning  top,  with  portraits  of  that  new  instru- 
ment of  science.  In  his  newspaper,  also,  were  given  views  of  the  cork-jackets, 
and  sketches  of  the  boomerang.  There,  too,  were  occasionally  exhibited  sketch- 
es of  himself  in  the  Mersey  —  floating,  swimming,  or  trying  to  perform  some 
such  notable  aquatic  feat.  For  a  long  series  of  yeai's  —  certainly  exceeding 
thirty  —  half  a  column  a  week  was  dedicated,  by  this  illustrious  obscure,  to 
himself,  his  notions,  and  his  hobbies.  So  strongly  did  he  exhibit  the  spirit  of 
egotism  in  these  articles,  that  it  was  frequently  remarked,  that  his  biography 
might  easily  be  compiled  from  the  personal  references  to  himself  and  his  move- 
ments in  the  "  Notices  to  Correspondents."  On  one  occasion  he  announced, 
that  having  charitably  lent  an  old  umbrella  to  a  strange  lady,  in  a  shower  ot 
rain,  she  actually  had  the  dishonesty  not  to  return  it,  and  during  many  succes- 
sive weeks,  he  poured  out  lamentations  on  his  loss,  describing  the  aspect  of 
the  article,  the  attire  of  the  non-returning  borrower,  and  amusing  the  pubh'p 
with  his  griefs  over  the  missing  umbrella, 

"  '  Like  the  lost  Pleiad,  seen  no  more  below.' 
Nor   were  his  personal  confidences  limited  to  his  newspaper.      Thence  they 
were   transferred   to   a  cheap  literary  weakling  which  he   also  published,  and 


BOT   SMITH.  259 

* 

he  is  omniscient ;  and  if  I  were  a  believer  in  the  transmigra- 
tion of  souls,  I  should  be  disposed  to  think  that  the  spirit  of 
the  professor  at  Bruges,  who  challenged  all  mankind  to  dis- 
pute with  him  "  de  omni  scibili  et  de  quolibet  enie,"  had  reap- 
peared in  his  person;  though  I  hope  that  he  would  be  less 
puzzled  in  solving  the  question  of  law  proposed  by  Sir  Thomas 
More  to  that  celebrated  scholar  respecting  a  replevin.* 

finally  found  a  resting  place  in  a  monthly  octavo  composed  of  the  picked  mat 
tor  of  his  newspaper  and  periodical.  Meddling  with  Cobbett,  in  an  attempt 
at  political  discussion,  he  incurred  the  anger  of  that  nervous  writer,  who  forth- 
with registered  him  as  '  Bot  Smith,'  by  which  appellation,  constantly  repeated 
by  him  of  the  Gridiron,  he  eventually  became  so  well  known,  in  and  out  of 
Liverpool,  that  it  was  taken  to  be  his  true  name,  and  letters  were  frequently  so 
addressed  to  him.  In  a  word,  his  case  affords  a  striking  example  of  the  very 
small  degree  of  intelligence  sufficient  to  establish  a  local  reputation  as  a  '  triton 
of  the  minnows.'  In  a  metropolis  such  a  person  would  have  speedily  found 
his  level,  beneath  the  feet  of  real  merit.  When  he  died,  about  the  year  1841, 
his  townsmen  gave  him  the  honor  of  a  public  funeral,  and  I  have  heard  that 
they  placed  his  statue  in  their  Mechanics'  Institute  !  As  the  palette  of  Wilkie 
was  let  into  the  pedestal  of  his  statue  in  the  National  Gallery,  in  London,  a 
spinning-top  and  china-plate  should  have  been  introduced  into  the  Smith  statue 
at  Liverpool.  When  the  Pickwick  Papers  introduced  the  clever  and  striking  full- 
length  of  Mr.  Pott,  Editor  of  the  Eatanswill  Gazette,  many  persons  in  Liver- 
pool fancied  that  independent  of  the  name  being  suggestive  of  the  soubriquet 
bestowed  on  him  by  Cobbett,  the  original  could  have  been  no  other  than  their 
own  philosopher  of  the  spinning-top.  The  appearance  —  'a  tall,  thin  man, 
with  a  sandy-colored  head  inclined  to  baldness,  and  a  face  in  which  solemn 
importance  was  blended,  with  a  look  of  unfathomable  profundity;'  the  invari- 
able attire  —  'a  long  brown  surtout,  with  a  black  cloth  waistcoat,  and  drab 
trousers ;'  the  constant  reference  in  conversation,  to  articles  which  he  had 
written  in  his  newspaper  on  local  politics,  the  interest  of  which,  trifling  at  any 
time,  had  long  since  passed  away;  the  ruling  idea,  that  throughout  the  coun- 
try in  general,  and  in  London  in  particular,  there  was  an  intense  excitement 
caused  by  whatever  he  wrote ;  the  constant  and  uncourteous  abuse  of  all  oppo- 
sing journalists;  and,  to  crown  all,  the  triumphant  boast  that  his  critic  had 
written  on  Chinese  Metaphysics  by  reading  in  the  Encyclopedia  under  C  foi 
China,  and  under  M  for  Metaphysics,  and  'had  combined  his  information,'  — 
if  all  these  coincidences  were  accidental,  then,  at  hap-hazard,  did  Mr.  Dickem 
unconsciously  exhibit  a  person  and  an  idiosyncracy  remai'kably  like  those  ol 
Mr.  Bot  Smith."— M. 

*  Mr.  Foster  is  deeply  versed  in  Irish  antiquities.  He  alleges  that  he  dis 
covered  in  the  county  of  Kerry,  a  very  singular  building,  which  is  called  Stnignt 
Fort.  General  Vallancey  thought  that  it  was  a  Phoenician  theatre.  I  am  no< 
awaie  what  conjecture  Mr.  Foster  formed  respecting  it;  probably  he  takes  il 


§60  JOHN    LESLIE    FOSTER. 

I  pass,  by  a  natural  transition,  from  the  vast  acquirements 
of  Mr.  Foster,  to  that  office  which,  from  its  connection  with 
learning,  it  would  appear  at  first  view  that  he  was  admirably 
qualified  to  fill.  He  was,  for  a  considerable  period,  a  Commis- 
sioner of  Education,  with  an  enormous  salary;  and  thus,  with 
the  sums  which  he  has  received  as  a  Commissioner  of  Inquiry 
into  the  Courts  of  Justice,  and  his  vast  emoluments  as  counsel 
to  the  Commissioners  of  Customs  and  Excise,  Mr.  Foster  has 
poured  an  immense  quantity  of  the  public  money  into  his  cof- 
fers. But,  however  the  love  of  learning,  and  its  unquestion- 
able possession,  might  appear  to  render  Mr.  Foster  an  eligible 
person  to  investigate  the  progress  of  education,  yet  his  predi- 
lections, both  political  and  religious,  were  so  strong,  that  the 
Roman  Catholics  considered  the  appointment  of  a  person  so 
legally  orthodox,  to  report  upon  the  state  of  their  schools,  as 
an  injustice. 

In  order  to  give  some  aspect  of  fairness  to  this  proceeding, 
and  to  create  a  counterpoise  to  his  prejudices,  the  Government 
united  with  Mr.  Foster,  a  gentleman  in  every  way  well  adapted 
to  encounter  him,  the  Remembrancer  of  the  Court  of  Exche- 
quer, Mr.  Blake.  I  believe  that  it  was  not  anticipated  that 
that   gentleman  would   have   approved   himself   so  stout   and 

for  an  old  conventicle,  employed  by  the  Irish  Christians  before  Popery  was 
in  use.  Mr.  Bland,  the  writer  of  an  essay  in  the  Transactions  of  the  Royal 
Irish  Academy,  makes  the  following  observations  upon  Mr.  Foster's  claims  to 
the  discovery  of  this  building:  "About  nine  years  back,  Mr.  Leslie  Foster 
visited  this  country,  and  passed  Staigne  by  unnoticed ;  but  being  prevailed  on 
by  me,  he  was  reluctantly  induced  to  return  and  see  it.  He  afterward  published, 
in  some  periodical  work  or  newspaper,  an  account  of  it ;  and  being  ignorant, 
I  suppose,  of  what  I  have  stated,  respecting  Mr.  Pelham's  correspondence  with 
Genei'al  Vallancey,  he  considered  himself  the  first  discoverer  of  this  ancient 
structure." — Vol.  XIV.  p.  22.  [General  Vallancey,  who  was  born  in  1721,  and 
wrote  much  upon  the  Antiquities  of  Ireland,  was  not  "  a  son  of  the  sod.*'  In 
his  youth,  when  quartered  in  Ireland  as  an  officer  of  engineers,  he  closely  stt.d- 
ied  the  language,  antiquities,  and  topography  of  the  island.  He  closely  f.nd 
scientifically  surveyed  it  (for  which  Government,  gave  him  one  thousand  poinds 
sterling),  and  besides  contributing  to  various  periodicals,  wrote  a  Grammar  and 
Dictionary  of  the  Irish  language,  "  Collectanea  de  Rebus  Hibernicis,'s  &c. 
Finally,  he  attained  the  rank  of  General.  The  object  of  most  of  his  Irish 
works  was  to  show,  I  believe,  that  Ireland  was  peopled  by  the  Phoenicians 
When  Vallancey  died  (in  1812),  he  was  more  than  ninety  years  old. —  1\JL"] 


B1AKE    AND    FOSTER.  201 

uncompromising  an  asserter  of  the  interests  of  Lis  country  and 
the  honor  of  his  religion.  Mr.  Foster  had  originally,  from  his 
previous  habits  of  mystical  research,  and  from  his  familiarity 
with  the  mysterious,  great  advantages  over  Mr.  Blake,  in 
examining  the  Catholic  priesthood  upon  questions  of  dogmatic 
theology;  but  Mr.  Blake,  who  lias  extraordinary  powers  of 
acquiring  knowledge,  and  of  fitting  his  mind  to  every  intellec 
tual  occupation,  resolved  to  make  himself  a  match  for  this 
Aquinas  of  Protestantism,  and  threw  himself  off  from  the 
heights  of  the  law  into  the  deepest  lore  into  which  Mr.  Foster 
had  ever  plunged.  He  rose  from  the  dark  bottoms  of  divinity 
as  black  and  as  begrimed  with  mysteries  as  his  brother  Com 
missioner;  and,  thus  prepared,  they  set  off  upon  their  tour 
through  the  Catholic  colleges  of  Ireland. 

The  object  of  Leslie  Foster  was  to  bring  out  whatever  was 
unfavorable  to  the  Irish  priesthood  ;  while  Mr.  Blake  (himself 
a  Roman  Catholic)  justly  endeavored  to  rectify  the  miscon- 
structions of  his  brother  inquirer,  and  to  present  the  doctrines 
of  his  religion,  and  the  character  of  its  ministers,  in  the  least 
exceptionable  form.  When  Mr.  Foster  got  hold  of  a  country 
priest,  and  put  him  to  his  shifts  by  some  interrogatory  touching 
the  decrees  of  the  earlier  Councils,  Mr.  Blake  Avould  intervene, 
and  rescue  his  fellow-Catholic  from  his  embarrassments  by 
suggesting  a  solution  of  the  difficulty  ;  and,  without  getting 
into  it,  helped  him  out  of  the  deep  quagmire  of  theology  into 
which  his  examiner  had  led  him.  If  Mr.  Foster  attempted  to 
quote  a  passage  from  some  moth-eaten  folio  with  any  deviation 
from  a  just  fidelity  of  citation,  Mr.  Blake  would  immediately 
detect  him.  Mr.  Foster  would  rely  upon  the  disputable  ethics 
of  some  ancient  Catholic  schoolman  ;  and  Mr.  Blake  would 
straight  produce  a  Protestant  divine  who  inculcated  the  same 
doctrine.  Sometimes  Mr.  Blake,  not  contented  with  acting  on 
the  defensive,  would  invade  the  enemy's  territory  ;  and  if  an 
ex  priest  were  tendered  by  Mr.  Foster  for  cross-examination, 
the  Popish  Remembrancer  of  the  Exchequer  exhibited  all  his 
acumen  and  dexterity  in  exposing  the  renegade.  A  person  of 
the  name  of  Dickson,  who  had  been  a  Catholic  priest,  was 
produced  in  order  to  vilify  Maynooth,  where  he  had  received 


%2  JOHN   LESLIE  fOSTEtt. 

his  eleemosynary  education..  Mr.  Blake  took  hold  of  him,  and, 
by  a  series  of  admirable  interrogatories,  eminently  distin- 
guished by  astuteness  and  power  of  combination,  laid  this 
deserter  of  his  altars  bare,  and  tore  off  his  apostate  surplice. 

But  this  was  not  the  most  remarkable  instance  in  which  Mr. 
Foster  was  foiled  in  his  efforts  to  convert  his  office  into  the 
means  of  promoting  his  religious  and  political  opinions.  He 
had  the  misfortune  to  fall  into  the  hands  of  the  Provincial  of 
the  Jesuits  in  Ireland,  the  Rev.  Mr.  Kenny.  A  desire  was,  if 
I  rightly  recollect,  expressed  by  Sir  T.  Lethbridge,*  that  a 
Jesuit  should  be  produced  at  the  bar  of  the  House  of  Commons, 
in  order  that  some  sort  of  judgment  should  be  formed  of  the 
peculiar  nature  of  the  ecclesiastical  animal.  Mr.  Kenny  is  the 
most  perfect  specimen  of  this  class  of  Catholic  phenomena  that 
could  be  produced.  He  wants,  it  must  be  confessed,  some  of 
the  external  attributes  which  should  enter  into  the  composition 
of  the  beau  ideal  of  Jesuitism.  He  is  by  no  means  gracefully 
constructed  ;  for  there  is  a  want  of  level  about  his  shoulders, 
and  his  countenance,  when  uninvested  with  his  spiritual  expres- 
sion, is  rather  of  a  forbidding  and  lurid  cast.  The  eyes  are 
of  deep  and  fiery  jet,  and  so  disposed,  that  while  one  is  bent 
in  humility  to  the  earth,  the  other  is  raised  in  inspiration  to 
Heaven; — brows  of  thick  and  bushy  black  spread  in  straight 
lines  above  them.  His  rectilinear  forehead  is  strongly  in- 
dented with  passion  —  satire  sits  upon  his  thin  lips,  and  a  livid 
hue  is  spread  over  a  quadrangular  face,  the  sunken  cheeks  of 
which  exhibit  the  united  effects  of  monastic  abstinence  and 
profound  meditation.  The  countenance  is  Irish  in  its  configur- 
ation ;  but  Mr.  Kenny  Avas  educated  at  Palermo,  and  a  Sicilian 
suavity  of  manner  is  thrown,  like  a  fine  silken  veil,  over  his 
strong  Hibernian  features.  The  beaming  rays  of  his  eye  are 
seldom  allowed  to  break  out,  for  they  are  generally  bent  to  the 
ground,  and  habitually  concealed  by  lids,  fringed  with  long 
dark  lashes,  which  drop  studiously  over  them. 
•    Such  is  the  outward  Jesuit: — his  talents  and  acquitments 

*  A  county  member  of  Parliament,  bull-headed  and  intolerant,  who,  from  the 
material  of  one  of  his  garments,  was  usually  called  "  Sir  Thomas  Leather 
breeches."  —  M. 


a  jEstfrr.  263 

are  of  tlie  first  order,  and  in  argumentative  eloquence  lie  lias 
no  superior  in  Ireland.  Leslie  Foster,  in  the  spirit  of  theologi- 
cal chivalry,  and  having  set  up  as  a  knight-errant  against 
popery,  happened  to  meet  with  this  disciple  of  Loyala,  and 
resolved  to  break  a  syllogism  with  him.  Mr.  Kenny  was  duly 
summoned  to  attend  the  Commissioners  of  Education,  and 
upon  this  occasion  the  interposition  of  Mr.  Blake  was  quite 
unnecessary.  With  a  blended  expression  of  affected  humility 
and  bitter  mockery,  the  follower  of  Ignatius  answered  all  Mr. 
Foster's  questions,  correcting  the  virulence  of  sarcasms  by  the 
softness  of  his  mellifluous  cadences,  and  b}7  the  religious  clasp- 
ing of  his  hands,  which  were  raised  in  such  a  way  as  to  touch 
the  extremities  of  his  chin,  while  he  lamented,  with  a  dolorous 
voice,  the  lamentable  ignorance  and  delusion  of  the  gentleman 
who  could,  in  the  nineteenth  century,  put  him  such  prepos- 
terous interrogatories. 

Leslie  Foster  was  baffled  by  every  response,  and  amid  the 
jeers  of  his  brother  Commissioners,  with  Mr.  Blake  compas- 
sionating him  on  one  side,  and  Mr.  Glascot*  nudging  him  at 
the  other,  while  Frankland  Lewis  trod  upon  his  toes,  was  at 
length  persuaded  to  give  up  his  desperate  undertaking.  Some 
of  the  questions  put  to  the  Jesuit  were  rather  of  an  offensive 
character;  and  one  of  the  Commissioners,  when  the  examina- 
tion had  concluded,  begged  that  he  would  make  allowance  for 
the  imperious  sense  of  duty  which  had  induced  Mr.  Foster  to 
commit  an  apparent  violation  of  the  canons  of  good  breeding. 
"  Holy  Ignatius  !"  exclaimed  the  son  of  Loyola,  holding  his 
arms  meekly  upon  his  breast,  "I  am  not  offended  —  I  never 
saw  a  more  simple-minded  gentleman  in  all  my  life!" 

Mr.  Foster,  so  far  as  the  receipt  of  the  public  money  is  con 
cerned,  does  not  bear  out  the  Jesuit's  ejaculation.  He  has  not 
proved  himself  exceedingly  simple,  by  uniformly  adopting  that 
course  of  political  conduct  which  was  calculated  to  advance 
his  personal  interests  and  to  better  his  fortune.  I  have  already 
mentioned  that  he  received  large  annual  stipends  from  Govern- 

*  Toby  Glascot  was  a  sharp  Dublin  attorney,  who  sided  with  the  then  dom- 
inant Ascendency  party.  In  1829,  he  made  a  show  of  starting  as  a  candidate, 
against  O'Connell,  after  the  Catholic  Relief  Bill  was  passed. —  M. 


§64-.  JOHN   LESLIE   FOSTER. 

ment  as  commissioner  of  education  and  of  justice.  His  chief 
source  of  emolument,  the  fountain  from  which  his  Pactolug 
flows,  is  in  the  revenue  of  Ireland  ;  and,  I  conceive  that,  in  his 
instance,  a  very  unqualified  job  has  recently  been  effected, 
notwithstanding  all  the  boasted  cleansing  of  that  Cloaca 
Maxima,  the  Customhouse.  I  put  all  levity  aside,  because,  in 
my  judgment,  the  expedient  by  which  an  annual  sum  of  two 
thousand  pounds  sterling  has  been  given  to  him  calls  for  decided 
condemnation ;  and  furthermore,  I  am  of  opinion,  that  he  is 
bound  to  resign  his  seat  in  Parliament  under  the  Irish  statute 
passed  in  the  thirty-third  year  of  the  late  King. 

Mr.  Foster  was  appointed  counsel  to  the  Commissioners  of 
Customs  and  Excise  in  April,  1818.  He  succeeded  Sir  Charles 
Ormsby,  with  a  salary  of  one  hundred  pounds  sterling  a  year, 
payable  by  the  Board  of  Customs,  with  certain  fees  on  each 
brief.  The  Irish  Board  of  Customs  was  annihilated  by  the 
Consolidation  Act,  which  abolished  the  employments  held 
under  their  authority.  The  office  held  by  Mr.  Foster  was 
abolished  as  never  having  been  necessary  or  useful,  and  the 
Lords  of  the  Treasury  recognise  that  abolition.  If  Mr.  Foster 
has  lost  his  original  appointment,  and  in  lieu  thereof  the  Crown 
retain  him  (is  not  every  information  in  the  name  of  the 
Crown,  and  is  he  not  its  counsel?)  "to  act  as  counsel  to  the 
Board,  with  a  salary  of  662000  a  year,"  to  be  payable  without 
any  reference  to  the  extent  or  even  the  existence  of  business, 
this  is  a  new  office  under  the  Crown  ;  and  if  it  be,  he  must 
resign  his  seat,  under  the  33d  of  George  III.,  cap.  41,  in  which 
it  is  enacted,  by  section  4,  that,  "  if  any  member  of  the  House 
of  Commons  shall  accept  any  office  of  profit  from  the  Crown, 
during  such  time  as  he  shall  continue  a  member,  his  seat  shall 
thereupon  become  vacant,  and  a  writ  shall  issue  for  a  new 
election."  The  41st  of  George  III.  virtually  re-enacts  these 
clauses.  In  that  event,  Harry  Mills  and  the  Doctor  will  again 
parade  the  streets  of  Dundalk;  Leslie  Foster  will  again  wipe 
the  cold  exsudation  from  his  forehead  with  an  orange  kerchief, 
but  he  will  not  again  be  carried  in  triumph  through  the  woods 
of  Cullen,  amidst  the  applauses  of  the  yeomanry,  the  hurras 
of  the  parson,  the  sexton,  and  the  parish  clerk,  and  the  accla- 
mations of  the  police. 


THE   CLARE   ELECTION,   IN  182S. 

The  Catholics  had  passed  a  resolution,  at  one  of  their  aggre- 
gate meetings,  to  oppose  the  election  of  every  candidate  who 
should  not  pledge  himself  against  the  Duke  of  Wellington's 
Administration.  This  measure  lay  for  some  time  a  mere  dead 
letter  in  the  registry  of  the  Association,  and  was  gradually 
passing  into  oblivion,  when  an  incident  occurred  which  gave  it 
an  importance  far  greater  than  had  originally  belonged  to  it. 
Lord  John  .Russell,  flushed  with  the  victory  which  had  been 
achieved  in  the  repeal  of  the  Test  and  Corporation  Acts,*  and 
grateful  to  the  Duke  of  Wellington  for  the  part  which  he  had 
taken,  wrote  a  letter  to  Mr.  O'Connell,  in  which  he  suggested 
that  the  conduct  of  his  Grace  had  been  so  fair  and  manly  tow- 
ard the  Dissenters  as  to  entitle  him  to  their  gratitude ;  and 
that  they  would  consider  the  reversal  of  the  resolution  which 
had  been  passed  against  his  government  as  evidence  of  the  in- 
terest which  was  felt  in  Ireland,  not  only  in  the  great  question 
peculiarly  applicable  to  that  country,  but  in  the  assertion  of 
religious  freedom  through  the  empire.  The  authority  of  Lord 
John  Russell  is  considerable,  and  Mr.  O'Connell,  under  the 
influence  of  his  advice,  proposed  that  the  anti-Wellington  res- 

*  In  February,  1828,  Lord  John  Russell  introduced  a  bill  for  the  abolition 
of  the  Test  and  Corporation  Acts  (which  subjected  Dissenters  to  civil  disabili 
lies  on  account  of  their  religious  faith),  and  it  passed  into  a  law  that  session, 
chiefly  in  consequence  of  the  feeble  opposition  offered  to  it  by  Peel,  then  Min- 
isterial leader  in  the  Commons.  In  truth,  Peel  was  just  then  in  a  transition 
state,  having  seen  that  the  old  Tory  system  of  intolerance  could  not  continue, 
and  scarcely  knowing  how  to  change  it.  Observant  politicians  judged,  when 
relief  was  afforded  to  the  Dissenters,  that  justice  to  the  Catholics  must  follow 
it  did,  in  1829.  —  M. 

Vol.  II.— 12 


266  CLARE   ELECTION. 

olution  should  be  withdrawn.  Tins  motion  was  violently  op- 
posed, and  Mr.  O'Connell  perceived  that  the  antipathy  to  the 
Great  Captain  was  more  deeply  rooted  than  he  had  originally 
imagined.  After  a  long  and  tempestuous  debate,  he  suggested 
an  amendment,  in  which  the  principle  of  his  original  motion 
was  given  up,  and  the  Catholics  remained  pledged  to  their 
hostility  to  the  Duke  of  Wellington's  Administration.  Mr. 
O'Connell  has  reason  to  rejoice  at  his  failure  in  carrying  this 
proposition;  for,  if  he  had  succeeded,  no  ground  for  opposing 
the  return  of  Mr.  Vesey  Fitzgerald  would  have  existed. 

The  promotion  of  that  gentleman  to  a  seat  in  the  Cabinet 
created  a  vacancy  in  the  representation  of  the  county  of  Clare  ; 
and  an  opportunity  was  afforded  to  the  Roman  Catholic  body 
of  proving  that  the  resolution  which  had  been  passed  against 
the  Duke  of  Wellington's  Government  was  not  an  idle  vaunt, 
but  that  it  could  be  carried  in  a  striking  instance  into  effect. 
It  was  determined  that  all  the  power  of  the  people  should  be 
put  forth.*     The  Association  looked  round  for  a  candidate,  and, 

*  Clare  Election,  the  unexpected  result  of  which  certainly  compelled  Wel- 
lington and  Peel  to  grant  Catholic  Emancipation  in  1829,  took  place  under  the 
following  circumstances.  The  Catholic  Association  had  resolved  to  oppose  the 
election  or  re-election  of  any  member  of  a  Government  hostile  to  the  Catholic 
claims.  On  June  13,  1828  (the  Duke  of  Wellington  being  Premier),  Mr.  Vesey 
Fitzgerald,  who  had  always  voted  for  the  Catholics,  was  gazetted  President  of 
the  Board  of  Trade,  the  holder  of  which  office  is  always  a  Cabinet  Minister. 
On  the  16th  of  June,  he  was  also  appointed  Treasurer  to  the  Navy.  It  is  a 
constitutional  rule,  in  England,  that  no  office,  having  emolument  attached,  can 
be  conferred  by  the  Crown  on  a  member  of  the  House  of  Commons,  without 
his  thereby  vacating  his  seat :  which  explains  how,  on  a  change  of  Ministry, 
Parliamentary  business  is  usually  suspended  until  the  new  officials  have  gono 
back  to  their  different  constituencies,  for  re-election  or  rejection.  Mr.  Fitz- 
gerald, who  was  M.  P.  for  Clare  county,  therefore,  had  to  present  himself  to 
the  electors;  and  did  so,  without  any  anticipation  of  rejection.  Mr.  O'Connell, 
on  becoming  a  candidate,  pledged  h  s  professional  reputation  (than  which  none 
was  higher)  on  his  assertion  that,  f  elected,  he  could  take  his  seat  in  the 
House  of  Commons  without  taking  the  then  usual  oath  that  the  Catholic  reli- 
gion was  idolatrous.  Mr.  Charles  Butler,  the  eminent  Catholic  barrister  of 
London,  well  known  as  an  erudite  constitutional  lawyer,  unexpectedly  backed 
this  assertion  by  an  elaborate  argument  which  went  to  show  that  Mr.  O'Con- 
nell's  view  was  right.  The  election  commenced  on  June  30,  1828,  and  pro- 
ceeded as  graphically  related  by  Mr.  Sheil.     The  entire  constituency  of  the 


MAJOR   MACNAMARA.  267 

without  having  previously  consulted  him,  re-elected  Major 
M'Namara,  a  Protestant  in  religion,  a  Catholic  in  politics,  and 
a  Milesian  in  descent.  Although  he  is  equally  well  known  in 
Dublin  and  in  Clare,  his  provincial  is  distinct  from  his  metro- 
politan reputation.  In  Dublin  he  may  be  seen  at  half-past  four 
o'clock,  strolling,  with  a  lounge  of  easy  importance,  toward 
Kil dare-street  Club-house,  and  dresse'd  in  exact  imitation  of 
the  King  [George  IV.J  ;  to  whose  royal  whiskers  the  Major's 
are  considered  to  bear  a  profusely-powdered  and  highly-frizzled 
affinity.  Not  contented  with  this  single  point  of  resemblance, 
he  has,  by  the  entertainment  of  "  a  score  or  two  of  tailors,"  and 
the  profound  study  of  the  regal  fashions,  achieved  a  complete 
look  of  Majesty;  and,  by  the  turn  of  his  coat,  the  dilation  of 
his  chest,  and  an  aspect  of  egregious  dignity,  succeeded  in  pro 
ducing  in  his  person  a  very  fine  effigy  of  his  sovereign. 

With  respect  to  his  moral  qualities,  he  belongs  to  the  good 
old  school  of  Irish  gentlemen  ;  and,  from  the  facility  of  his 
manners,  and  his  graceful  mode  of  arbitrating  a  difference,  has 
acquired  a  very  eminent  character  as  "  a  friend."  No  man  is 
better  versed  in  the  strategies  of  Irish  honor.     He  chooses  the 

county  of  Clare  was  eight  thousand,  of  whom  two  hundred  were  twenty  and 
fifty  pound  freeholders  and  rent-chargers,  while  the  rest  were  forty-shilling  free- 
holders—  the  class  who  had  beaten  the  Beresfords,  at  Waterford  election,  in 
1826,  and  would  have  been  disfranchised,  by  one  of  the  "  wings,"  had  the 
Catholic  Relief  Bill  been  passed  the  year  before.  The  polling  terminated  on 
Saturday,  July  5,  1828.  and  the  result  showed  —  for  O'Connell,  2,057  ;  for  Fitz- 
gerald, 982:  majority  for  O'Connell,  1,075.  When  the  state  of  the  poll  was 
announced,  the  friends  of  Mr.  Fitzgerald  presented  a  protest  to  the  High- 
Sheriff,  who  was  the  returning-officer,  claiming  that  Mr.  F.  be  declared  duly 
elected,  because  Mr.  O'Connell  was  a  Catholic,  and  had  publicly  declared  that 
ho  would  not  take  the  usual  oaths  to  sit  in  Parliament.  The  case  was  fully 
ai  jued  before  the  Sheriff  and  his  assessor  (a  lawyer  of  eminence),  and  the  result 
was  that  Mr.  O'Connell  must  be  returned  as  duly  elected  by  a  majority  of  votes  ; 
that  the  law  did  not  disqualify  a  Catholic  from  being  so  elected;  and  that 
whether  O'Connell  would  or  would  not  refuse  to  take  the  oaths,  to  which  he 
objected,  could  not  be  ascertained  until  his  appearance  in  the  House  of  Com- 
mons. So,  he  was  declared  member,  and  his  first  frank  was  on  a  letter  com- 
municating the  intelligence  to  his  wife.  He  exercised  the  privilege  of  frank- 
ing (abolished  by  the  penny-postage  act  in  1840)  from  the  day  of  his  election 
until  the  time  after  the  Catholic  Relief  Bill  was  passed,  when  he  was  not  allowed 
to  take  his  seat  without  taking  the  old  oaths,  which  he  refused  to  do. — M. 


268  CLARE   ELECTION. 

ground  with  an  O'Trigger  eye,  and  by  a  glance  over  "  the  fif- 
teen acres,'*  is  able  to  select,  with  an  instantaneous  accuracy, 
the  finest  position  for  the  settlement  of  a  quarrel.*  In  his  cal- 
culation of  distances,  he  displays  a  peculiarly  scientific  genius; 
and,  whether  it  be  expedient  to  bring  down  your  antagonist 
at  a  long  shot,  or  at  a  more  embarrassed  interval  of  feet,  you 
may  be  sure  of  the  Major's  loading  to  a  grain.  In  the  county 
of  Clare  he  does  not  merely  enact  the  part  of  a  sovereign.  He 
is  the  chief  of  the  clan  of  the  M'Namaras,  and  after  rehearsing 
the  royal  character  at  Kildare  street,  the  moment  he  arrives 
on  the  coast  of  Clare,  and  visits  the  oyster-beds  at  Poldoody,t 
becomes  "  every  inch  a  king."  He  possesses  great  influence 
with  the  people,  which  is  founded  upon  far  better  grounds  than 
their  hereditary  reverence  for  the  Milesian  nobility  of  Ireland. 
He  is  a  most  excellent  magistrate.  If  a  gentleman  should  en- 
deavor to  crush  a  poor  peasant,  Major  M'Namara  is  ready  to 
protect  him,  not  only  with  the  powers  of  his  office,  but  at  the 
risk  of  Iris  life.  This  creditable  solicitude  for  the  rights  and 
the  interests  of  the  lower  orders  had  rendered  him  most  de- 
servedly popular;  and,  in  naming  him  as  their  representative, 
the  Association  could  not  have  made  a  more  judicious  choice.f 
He  was  publicly  called  upon  to  stand. 

Some  days  elapsed,  and  no  answer  was  returned  by  the  Ma- 
jor. The  public  mind  was  thrown  into  suspense,  and  various 
conjectures  went  abroad  as  to  the  cause  of  this  singular  omis- 
sion. Some  alleged  that  he  was  gone  to  an  island  off  the  coast 
of  Clare,  where  the  proceedings  of  the  Association  had  not 
reached  him;  while  others  suggested  that  he  was  only  waiting 
until  the  clergy  of  the  county  should  declare  themselves  more 

*  In  Phoenix  Park,  the  suburban  residence  of  the  Lord-Lieutenant,  a  par- 
ticular part,  called  "The  Fifteen  Acres,"  was  noted  as  the  place  wheie  the 
Dublin  duellists  generally  had  their  little  "  affairs  of  honor."  Duelling  is  nearly 
extinct  in  Ireland  now.  —  M. 

t  The  Poldoody  and  Carlingford  oysters  were  as  popular  in  Ireland  as  the 
Colchester  and  Milton  in  London,  or  the  Shrewsbury  and  East  River  in  New 
York.  — M. 

X  Major  M'Namara,  who  was  O'Connell's  second  in  the  duel  with  D'Esterre, 
in  1815,  was  returned  to  Parliament,  by  his  Clare  neighbors,  after  Catholic 
Emancipation  was  obtained,  and  usually  voted  with  O'Connell.  He  died  much 
respected  by  all  parties,  but  was  a  very  commonplace  man.  —  M. 


THE    KIYAL    PRIESTHOOD.  269 

unequivocally  favorable  to  him.  The  latter,  it  was  said,  had 
evinced  much  apathy  ;  and  it  was  rumored  that  Dean  O'Shaugh- 
nessy,  who  is  a  distant  relative  of  Mr.  Fitzgerald,  had  inti- 
mated a  determination  not  to  support  any  anti-ministerial  can- 
didate. The  Major's  silence,  and  the  doubts  which  were  enter- 
tained with  regard  to  the  allegiance  of  the  priests,  created  a 
sort  of  panic  at  the  Association.  A  meeting  was  called,  and 
various  opinions  were  delivered  as  to  the  propriety  of  engaging 
in  a  contest,  the  issue  of  which  was  considered  exceedingly 
doubtful,  and  in  which  failure  would  be  attended  with  such 
disastrous  consequences.  Mr.  O'Oonnell  himself  did  not  ap- 
pear exceedingly  sanguine;  and  Mr.  Purcell  O'Gorman,  a  na- 
tive of  Clare,  and  who  had  a  minute  knowledge  of  the  feelings 
of  the  people,  expressed  apprehensions. 

There  were,  however,  two  gentlemen  (Mr.  O'Gorman  Mahon 
and  Mr.  Steele),  who  strongly  insisted  that  the  people  might 
be  roused,  and  that  the  priests  were  not  as  lukewarm  as  was 
imagined.  Upon  the  zeal  of  Dean  O'Shaughnessy,  however, 
a  good  deal  of  question  was  thrown.  By  a  singular  coinci- 
dence, just  as  his  name  was  uttered,  a  gentleman  entered,  who, 
but  for  the  peculiar  locality,  might  have  been  readily  mistaken 
for  a  clergyman  of  the  Established  Church.  Between  the 
priesthood  of  the  two  religions  there  are,  in  aspect  and  de- 
meanor, as  well  as  in  creed  and  discipline,  several  points  of 
affinity,  and  the  abstract  sacerdotal  character  is  readily  per- 
ceptible in  both.  The  parson,  however,  in  his  attitude  and 
attire,  presents  the  evidences  of  superiority,  and  carries  the 
mannerism  of  ascendency  upon  him.  A  broad-brimmed  hat, 
composed  of  the  smoothest  and  blackest  material,  and  drawn 
by  two  silken  threads  into  a  fire-shovel  configuration,  a  felici- 
tous adaptation  of  his  jerkin  to  the  symmetries  of  his  chest  and 
shoulder,  stockings  of  glossy  silk,  which  displayed  the  happy 
proportions  of  a  finely-swelling  leg,  a  ruddy  cheek,  and  a  bright, 
authoritative  eye,  suggested,  at  first  view,  that  the  gentleman 
who  had  entered  the  room  while  the  merits  of  Dean  O'Shaugh- 
nessy were  under  discussion,  must  be  a  minister  of  the  prosper- 
ous Christianity  of  the  Established  Church.  It  was,  however, 
no  other  than  Dean  O'Shaughnessy  himself. 


270  CLARE   ELECTION. 

He  was  received  with  a  burst  of  applause,  which  indicated 
that,  whatever  surmises  with  respect  to  his  fidelity  had  previ- 
ously gone  out,  his  appearance  before  that  tribunal  (for  it  is 
one)  was  considered  by  the  assembly  as  a  proof  of  his  devotion 
to  the  public  interest.  The  Dean,  however,  made  a  very  scho- 
lastic sort  of  oration,  the  gist  of  which  it  was  by  no  means  easy 
to  arrive  at.  He  denied  that  he  had  enlisted  himself  under 
Mr.  Fitzgerald's  banners,  but  at  the  same  time  studiously 
avoided  giving  any  sort  of  pledge.  He  did  not  state  distinctly 
what  his  opinion  was  with  respect  to  the  co-operation  of  the 
priests  with  the  Association  ;  and,  when  he  was  pressed,  begged 
to  be  allowed  to  withhold  his  sentiments  on  the  subject.  The 
Association  were  not,  however,  dismayed;  and  it  having  been 
conjectured  that  the  chief  reason  for  Major  M'Namara  having 
omitted  to  return  an  answer  was  connected  with  pecuniary  con- 
siderations, it  was  decided  that  so  large  a  sum  as  five  thousand 
pounds  of  the  Catholic  rent  should  be  allocated  to  the  expenses 
of  his  election. 

Mr.  O'Gorman  Mali  on  and  Mr.  Steele  were  directed  to  pro- 
ceed at  once  to  Clare,  in  order  that  they  might  have  a  personal 
interview  with  him  ;  and  they  immediately  set  off.  After  an 
absence  of  two  days,  Mr.  O'Gorman  Mahon  returned,  having 
left  his  colleague  behind  in  order  to  arouse  the  people ;  and  he 
at  length  conveyed  certain  intelligence  with  respect  to  the 
Major's  determination.  The  obligations  under  which  his  fam- 
ily lay  to  Mr.  Fitzgerald  were  such,  that  he  was  bound  in 
honor  not  to  oppose  him.  This  information  produced  a  feeling 
of  deep  disappointment  among  the  Catholic  body,  while  the 
Protestant  party  exulted  in  his  apparent  desertion  of  the  cause, 
and  boasted  that  no  gentleman  of  the  county  would  stoop  so 
low  as  to  accept  of  the  patronage  of  the  Association.  In  this 
emergency,  and  when  it  was  universally  regarded  as  an  utterly 
hopeless  attempt  to  oppose  the  Cabinet  Minister,  the  public 
were  astonished  by  an  address  from  Mr.  O'Connell  to  the  free- 
holders of  Clare,  in  which  he  offered  himself  as  a  candidate, 
and  solicited  their  support. 

Nothing  but  his  subsequent  success  could  exceed  the  sensa- 
tion which  was  produced  by  this  address,  and  all  eyes  were 


VESEY    FITZGERALD.  271 

turned  toward  the  field  in  which  so  remarkable  a  contest  was 
to  be  waged.  The  two  candidates  entered  the  lists  with  sig- 
nal advantages  upon  both  sides.  Mr.  O'Connell  had  an  un- 
paralleled popularity,  which  the  services  of  thirty  years  had 
secured  to  him.  Upon  the  other  hand,  Mr.  Yesey  Fitzgerald 
presented  a  combination  of  favorable  circumstances,  which 
rendered  the  issue  exceedingly  difficult  to  calculate.*  His 
father  had  held  the  office  of  Prime  Sergeant  at  the  Irish  Bar; 
and,  although  indebted  to  the  Government  for  his  promotion, 
had  the  virtuous  intrepidity  to  vote  against  the  Union.  This 
example  of  independence  had  rendered  him  a  great  favorite 
with  the  people.  From  the  moment  that  his  son  had  obtained 
access  to  power,  he  had  employed  his  extensive  influence  in 
doing  acts  of  kindness  to  the  gentry  of  the  County  of  Clare. 
He  had  inundated  it  with  the  overflowings  of  ministerial 
bounty.  The  eldest  sons  of  the  poorer  gentlemen,  and  the 
younger  branches  of  the  aristocracy,  had  been  provided  for 
through  his  means;  and  in  the  army,  the  navy,  the  treasury, 
the  Four  Courts,  and  the  Customhouse,  the  proofs  of  his  politi- 
cal friendship -were  everywhere  to  be  found. 

*  William  Vesey  Fitzgerald  was  the  son  of  James  Fitzgerald,  once  Prime 
Sergeant  of  Ireland,  and  Catherine  Vesey,  a  rich  co-heiress.  James  Fitzgerald 
who  had  held  several  high  offices  in  Ireland,  opposed  the  contemplated  Legis- 
lative Union  with  Great  Britain,  and  threw  up  his  rank  of  Prime  Sergeant, 
which  placed  him  at  the  head  of  the  legal  profession  in  Ireland,  whence  his 
transition  to  the  judicial  ermine  was  certain.  His  giving  up  place,  for  the  sake 
of  his  country,  made  him  extremely  popular.  His  eldest  son  entered  Parlia- 
ment, and  successively  became  Privy  Councillor,  Chancellor  of  the  Irish  Ex- 
chequer, Paymaster  of  the  Forces,  and  President  of  the  Boai'd  of  Trade.  He 
invariably  supported  Catholic  Emancipation,  and  not  the  less  warmly  because 
the  Catholic  leader  defeated  him  at  Clare.  His  mother  was  created  Baroness 
Fitzgerald  and  Vesci,  in  1827.  On  her  death,  in  1832,  Vesey  Fitzgerald  suc- 
ceeded to  this  title,  as  her  eldest  son.  In  January,  1835,  his  father  went  to  his 
long  and  last  resting-place,  aged  93.  In  the  same  year,  his  son  received  an 
English,  in  addition  to  his  Irish  barony,  and  became  a  Peer  of  the  United  King- 
dom. When  he  died  in  1843  (as  Lord  Fitzgerald  and  Vesci)  he  was  Lord 
Lieutenant  of  Clare.  He  was,  in  all  respects,  an  accomplished  gentleman,  an 
elegant  if  not  eloquent  speaker,  a  tried  friend  of  the  Catholics,  aad  an  excel- 
lent man  of  business.  At  the  Clare  Election,  in  1828,  his  good  temper,  true 
courtesy,  and  undoubted  amiability,  won  him  "  heaps  of  friends"  even  among 
the  very  men  who  voted  against  him.  Mr.  Shei!,  in  writing  of  him,  involunta- 
rily shows  how  greatly,  while  he  opposed,  he  estimated  him. —  INL 


272  CLAUJE   ELECTION. 

Independently  of  any  act  of  his  which  could  be  referred  to 
his  personal  interest,  and  his  anxiety  to  keep  up  his  influence 
in  the  county,  Mr.  Fitzgerald,  who  is  a  man  of  very  amiable 
disposition,  had  conferred  many  services  upon  his  Clare  ac- 
quaintances. Nor  was  it  to  Protestants  that  these  manifesta- 
tions of  favor  were  confined.  He  had  laid  not  only  the  Cath- 
olic proprietors,  but  the  Catholic  priesthood,  under  obligation. 
The  Bishop  of  the  diocese  himself  (a  respectable  old  gentle- 
man who  drives  about  in  a  gig  with  a  mitre  upon  it)  is  sup- 
posed not  to  have  escaped  from  his  bounties ;  and  it  is  more 
than  insinuated  that  some  droppings  of  ministerial  manna  had 
fallen  upon  him.  The  consequence  of  this  systematized  and 
uniform  plan  of  benefaction  is  obvious.  The  sense  of  obliga- 
tion was  heightened  by  the  manners  of  this  extensive  distrib- 
uter of  the  favors  of  the  Crown,  and  converted  the  ordinary 
feeling  of  thankfulness  into  one  of  personal  regard.  To  this 
array  of  very  favorable  circumstances,  Mr.  Fitzgerald  brought 
the  additional  influence  which  arose  from  his  recent  promotion 
to  the  Cabinet;  which,  to  those  who  had  former  benefits  to 
return,  afforded  an  opportunity  for  the  exercise  of  that  kind  of 
prospective  gratitude  which  has  been  described  to  consist  of  a 
lively  sense  of  services  to  come.  These  were  the  comparative 
advantages  with  which  the  ministerial  and  the  popular  candi- 
date engaged  in  this  celebrated  contest;  and  Ireland  stood  by 
to  witness  the  encounter. 

Mr.  O'Connell  did  not  immediately  set  off  from  Dublin  ;  but, 
before  his  departure,  several  gentlemen  were  despatched  from 
the  Association  in  order  to  excite  the  minds  of  the  people,  and 
to  prepare  the  way  for  him.  The  most  active  and  useful  of 
the  persons  who  were  employed  upon  this  occasion  were  the 
two  gentlemen  to  whom  I  have  already  referred,  Mr.  Steele 
and  Mr.  O'Gorman.  They  are  both  deserving  of  special  com- 
mendation. The  former  is  a  Protestant  of  a  respectable  for- 
tune in  the  County  of  Clare,*  and  who  has  all  his  life  beer/ 

*  The  late  "Tom  Steele,"  as  he  was  familiarly  called,  is  supposed  not  to 
have  had  an  enemy  in  the  world.  He  was  horn  November  3,  1788,  and  was  a 
member  of  a  Protestant  family  in  Clare,  where  he  succeeded  to  considerable 
lauded  property.     He  was  a  graduate  of  the  Universities  of  Dublin  and  Cam- 


THOMAS   STEELE.  273 

devoted  to  the  assertion  of  liberal  principles.  In  Trinity  Col- 
lege, he  was  among  the  foremost  of  the  advocates  of  emanci- 
pation, and  at  that  early  period  became  the  intimate  associate 
of  many  Roman  Catholic  gentlemen  who  have  since   distin- 

bridge  and  distinguished  himself  at  both;  a  member  of  the  London  Institution 
of  Civil  Engineers  (admitted  for  his  improvements  in  diving  machinery  and 
sub-marine  illumination)  ;  one  of  the  defenders  of  Cadiz,  in  1823,  under  the 
command  of  Sir  Robert  Wilson;  seconded  O'Connell's  nomination  at  Clare 
election  in  1828 ;  was  an  original  member  of  Birmingham  Political  Union 
from  its  formation  in  1830,  and  thus  an  instrument  of  the  Grey  Ministry  in  car- 
rying the  Reform  Bill ;  threw  himself,  with  intense  earnestness,  into  the  Email 
cipation  anti-tithe,  and  Repeal  movements;  was  O'Connell's  Head  Pacific ato. 
and  Repeal  Warden-in-Chief  for  all  Ireland ;  took  part  in  the  Monster  Meet- 
ings of  1843  ;  was  tried  and  convicted,  with  O'Connell  and  the  other  repealers,  in 
1844 ;  suffered  the  like  imprisonment  with  them,  which  was  subsequently  declared 
by  the  House  of  Lords  to  be  illegal ;  and  died  in  June,  1848,  at  Peele's  Coflfee- 
House,  in  London,  in  such  extreme  want,  that  he  would  have  starved  but  for 
the  humanity  of  the  landlord,  who  kindly  allowed  him  to  want  for  nothing 
Bitter  necessity  had  broken  his  heart,  and  driven  him  to  despair.  His  las 
moments  were  soothed  by  the  sympathy,  bounty,  and  personal  kindness  of  Lor^ 
Brougham  and  Colonel  Perceval  (the  Orangeman)  with  both  of  whom,  as  pub- 
lic men,  he  had  waged  political  strife.  How  his  fortune  went  it  is  hard  to  say. 
His  personal  expenditure  was  small.  He  disbursed  a  good  deal  in  scientific 
investigations,  and  also  in  attempting  to  improve  the  navigation  of  the  Shan- 
non at  his  own  expense  —  his  plan  has  since  been  successfully  carried  out  by  a 
Parliamentary  grant.  In  the  State  Trials  of  1844,  when  he  was  very  restless 
and  talkative,  interrupting  the  proceedings,  Mr.  Smith,  then  Attorney-General, 
turned  round  and  said,  "  Steele,  if  you  do  not  keep  quiet,  I  shall  certainly  strike 
your  name  out  of  the  indictment."  This  threat  of  depriving  him  of  the  honors 
of  political  persecution  and  martyrdom,  immediately  silenced  Tom  Steele  !  He 
was  a  tall,  muscular,  well-built  man,  who  arrayed  himself  in  a  military  blue  frock, 
with  the  Repeal  button.  His  face  was  full  of  amiability  and  honesty.  He 
spoke  more  earnestly. than  eloquently.  He  was  one  of  the  most  sincere  and 
least  selfish  of  public  men.  He  had  not  room  in  his  heart  for  one  ungenerous 
or  unmanly  feeling.  He  loved  O'Connell  with  a  love  almost  passing  that  of 
woman.  Ireland  ought  not  to  have  allowed  Tom  Steele  to  die,  almost  a 
pauper,  in  a  foreign  land.  His  departure  from  life  should  have  been  in  the 
country   he  would  have  died  to  serve,  amid  "  troops  of  friends,"  and  not  to  be 

"  By  strangers  honored,  and  by  strangers  mourned." 
I  remember  when  his  death  (and  its  manner)  was  communicated  to  the  Lon- 
doners, how  men  whom  I  had  always  considered  apathetic,  met  me  in  the 
street,  pressed  my  hand,  which  had  often  been  grasped  in  his,  and  said,  in  bro- 
ken accents,  and  with  moistened  eyes,  "  Poor  Tom  Steele."  The  chivalry  ol 
his  character  and  conduct  had  smitten  the  rock,  and  the  fountain  of  feeling 
gushed  forth,  when  his  gallant  life  had  passed  away. —  M. 

:2* 


274  CLARE    ELECTION. 

guished  themselves  in  the  proceedings  of  their  body.  Being  a 
man  of  independent  circumstances,  Mr.  Steele  did  not  devote 
himself  to  any  profession,  and  having  a  zealous  and  active 
mind,  he  looked  round  for  occupation.  The  Spanish  Avar 
afforded  him  a  field  for  the  display  of  that  generous  enthusiasm 
by  which  he  is  distinguished.  He  joined  the  patriot  army, 
and  fought  with  a  desperate  valor  upon  the  batteries  of  the 
Trocadero.  It  Avas  only  Avhen  Cadiz  had  surrendered,  and 
the  cause  of  Spain  beeame  utterly  hopeless,  that  Mr.  Steele 
relinquished  this  noble  undertaking.  He  returned  to  England, 
surrounded  by  exiles  from  the  unfortunate  country  for  the 
liberation  of  which  he  had  repeatedly  exposed  his  life.  It 
was  impossible  for  a  man  of  so  much  energy  of  character  to 
remain  in  torpor;  and  on  his  arrival  in  Ireland,  faithful  to  the 
principles  by  which  he  had  been  uniformly  swayed,  he  joined 
the  Catholic  Association.  There  he  delivered  several  power- 
ful and  enthusiastic  declamations  in  favor  of  religious  liberty. 
Such  a  man,  hoAvever,  Avas  fitted  for  action  as  Avell  as  for 
harangue;  and  the  moment  the. contest  in  Clare  began,  he 
threAv  himself  into  the  combat  Avith  the  same  alacrity  with 
which  he  had  rushed  upon  the  French  bayonets  at  Cadiz. 
He  was  serviceable  in  various  Avays.  He  opened  the  political 
campaign  by  intimating  his  readiness  to  fight  any  landlord  who 
should  conceive  himself  to  be  aggrieved  by  an  interference 
with  his  tenants.  This  was  a  very  impressive  exordium.  He 
then  proceeded  to  canvass  for  votes;  and,  assisted  by  his 
intimate  friend  Mr.  O'Gorman  Mahon,  travelled  through  the 
country,  and,  by  both  day  and  night,  addressed  the  people 
from  the  altars  round  which  they  were  assembled  to  hear  him. 
It  is  no  exaggeration  to  say,  that  to  him,  and  to  his  intrepid 
and  indefatigable  confederate,  the  success  of  Mr.  O'Connell 
is  greatly  to  be  ascribed. 

Mr.  O'Gorman  Mahon  is  introduced  into  this  article  as  one 
among  many  figures.  He  would  deserve  to  stand  apart  in  a 
portrait*     Nature  has  been  peculiarly  favorable  to  him.     He 

*  James  O'Gorman  Mahon  subsequently  entered  Parliament,  and  made  some 
e-ood  speeches  on  popular  subjects.  He  was  declared  unseated  for  want  of 
t  toperty  qualification  (three  hui  dred  pounds  sterling  for  a  borough,  and  five 


ME.    (^GORMAN    MASON.  275 

lias  a  very  striking  physiognomy,  of  the  Corsair  character, 
which  the  Protestant  Gnlnares,  and  the  Catholic  Medoras,  find 
it  equally  difficult  to  resist.  His  figure  is  tall,  and  he  is  pecu- 
liarly free  and  degage  in  all  his  attitudes  and  movements.  In 
any  other  his  attire  would  appear  singularly  fantastical.  His 
manners  are  exceedingly  frank  and  natural,  and  have  a  char- 
acter of  kindliness  as  well  as  of  self-reliance  imprinted  upon 
them.  He  is  wholly  free  from  embarrassment  and  maMvaise 
honte,  and  carries  a  well-founded  consciousness  of  his  personal 
merit;  which  is,  however,  so  well  united  with  urbanity,  that 
it  is  not  in  the  slightest  degree  offensive.  His  talents  as  a 
popular  speaker  are  considerable.  He  derives  from  external 
qualifications  an  influence  over  the  multitude,  which  men  of 
diminutive  stature  are  somewhat  slow  of  obtaining.  A  little 
man  is  at  first  view  regarded  by  the  great  body  of  spectators 
with  disrelish  ;  and  it  is  only  by  force  of  phrase,  and  by  the 
charm  of  speech,  that  he  can  at  length  succeed  in  inducing 
his  auditors  to  overlook  any  infelicity  of  configuration;  but 
when  O'Gorman  Mahon  throws  himself  out  before  the  people, 
and,  touching  his  whiskers  with  one  hand,  brandishes  the 
other,  an  enthusiasm  is  at  once  produced,  to  which  the  fair 
portion  of  the  spectators  lend  their  tender  contribution.  Such 
a  man  was  exactly  adapted  to  the  excitement  of  the  people  of 
Clare;  and  it  must  be  admitted,  that  by  his  indefatigable 
exertions,  his  unremitting  activity,  and  his  devoted  zeal,  he 
most  materially  assisted  in  the  election  of  Mr.  O'Connell. 

While  Mr.  Steele  and  Mr.  O'Gorman  Mahon  harangued  the 
people  in  one  district,  Mr.  Lawless,  who  was  also  despatched 
upon  a  similar  mission,  applied  his  faculties  of  excitation  in 
another..  This  gentleman  has  obtained  deserved  celebrity  by 
-lis  being  almost  the  only  individual  among  the  Irish  deputies 
who  remonstrated  against  the  sacrifice  of  the  rights  of  the 
forty-shilling  freeholders.  Ever  since  that  period  he  has  been 
eminently   popular;    and   although   he   may    occasionally,  by 

hundred  pounds  a  year  for  a  county  member)  and  abandoned  public  life  for  a 
considerable  time.  He  again  entered  Parliament,  in  1847,  but  was  not  re« 
olected  in  1852  He  was  a  remarkably  baiidsome  man,  in  1828;  and  dressori 
in  a  sliowv  manner. —  M. 


2?6  CLARE  ELECTION. 

ebullitions  of  ill-regulated  but  generous  enthusiasm,  create  a 
little  merriment  among  those -whose  minds  are  not  as  suscep- 
tible of  patriotic  and  disinterested  emotion  as  his  own,  yet  the 
conviction  which  is  entertained  of  his  honesty  of  purpose,  con- 
fers upon  him  a  considerable  influence..  "Honest  Jack  Law- 
less" is  the  designation  by  which  he  has  been  known  since  the 
"  wings"  were   in   discussion.*     He   has   many   distinguished 

*  To  have  been  called  "  Honest  Jack  Lawless,"  and  to  have  merited  the 
name,  must  be  considered  a  great  distinction.  John  Lawless  originally  studied 
for  the  Irish  bar,  but  his  friendship  for,  and  presumed  connection  with  Robert 
Emmett,  in  1803,  caused  Lord  Clare  to  reject  his  application  for  admission. 
Lawless,  who  was  full  of  energy,  bore  this  with  great  philosophy,  and,  relin- 
quishing law  and  precedents  for  malt  and  hops,  next  became  partner  in  a  brew 
ery  at  Dublin.  After  this,  he  yielded  to  his  political  and  literary  tastes,  and  be 
came  editor  of  a  newspaper  in  Newiy,  where  he  obtained  so  high  a  reputation 
for  the  touch-and-go  talent  which  makes  alike  a  light  comedian  and  a  "  gentleman 
of  the  press,"  that  he  was  invited  to  Belfast,  where  he  established  and  conducted 
an  excellent  journal  called  "  The  Irishman."  When  the  Catholic  Associa- 
tion was  founded,  John  Lawless  became  an  early  and  eager  member.  In  1825, 
he  opposed  O'Connell  on  "  The  Wings."  O'Connell's  chief  notice  (though 
the  opposition  annoyed  him)  was  a  complaint  of  "  the  under-growl  of  Jack 
Lawless."  After  this,  they  soon  were  reconciled  —  a  hollow  truce,  for,  in  1832, 
when  Lawless  was  defeated  in  a  contest  for  the  Parliamentary  representation 
of  Meath  County,  he  was  charged  by  O'Connell  with  having,  "  for  a  con-si-de- 
ra-ti-on"  (as  old  Trapbois  says),  sold  his  chances  of  being  elected.  Judging 
from  every  one  of  Lawless's  political  and  personal  antecedents,  this  charge 
was  unfounded.  Mr.  Lawless  died  in  August,  1837. — It  may  be  necessaiy  to 
state  that  "  The  Wings"  (to  which  Mr.  Lawless  and  several  other  patriotic 
Irishmen  were  so  much  opposed,  as  then  to  endanger  the  popularity  of  Mr. 
O'Connell,  who  certainly  did  not  resist  them),  were  drawbacks  with  which 
Catholic  Emancipation  was  to  have  been  clogged,  if  the  Bill  brought  in,  by  Sir 
Francis  Burdett,  in  1825,  had  passed  into  a  law.  They  were  embod- 
ied in  a  separate  Bill,  which  passed  through  several  stages,  but  was  necessarily 
abandoned,  when,  mainly  influenced  by  the  Duke  of  York's  "  So  help  me  God" 
speech,  the  House  of  Lords  rejected  Burdett's  bill,  and  thus  deferred  Emanci- 
pation until  1829.  By  one  "  wing"  the  forty  shilling  freehold  qualification,  to 
vote  at  Parliamentary  elections,  would  have  been  abolished,  and  no  one  allowed 
to  vote,  in  counties,  on  less  than  a  freehold  often  pounds  sterling  annual  value. 
By  the  other  "  wing,"  the  entire  Catholic  clergy  of  Ireland,  then  estimated  at 
two  thousand,  who  were  paid  by  the  people,  were  to  be  paid  by  the  Govern- 
ment, at  a  cost  of  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  pounds  sterling  a  year,  out 
of  the  public  money.  The  matter  for  wonder  is  that  any  Catholic,  who  com- 
plained of  being  called  upon  to  pay,  in  tithes,  for  the  maintenance  of  clergy- 
men of  another  faith,  could  not  have  perceived  the  anomaly  of  allowing  his 


MR.    LAWLESS.  277 

qualifications  as  a  public  speaker.  His  voice  is  deep,  round, 
and  mellow,  and  is  diversified  by  a  great  variety  of  rich  and 
harmonious  intonation.  His  action  is  exceedingly  graceful  and 
appropriate  :  he  has  a  good  figure,  which,  by  a  purposed  swell 
and  dilation  of  the  shoulders,  and  an  elaborate  erectness,  he 
turns  to  good  account;  and  by  dint  of  an  easy  fluency  of  good 
diction,  a  solemn  visage,  an  aquiline  nose  of  no  vulgar  dimen- 
sion, eyes  glaring  underneath  a  shaggy  brow  with  a  certain 
fierceness  of  emotion,  a  quizzing-glass,  which  is  gracefully 
dangled  in  any  pauses  of  thought  or  suspensions  of  utterance, 
and,  above  all,  by  a  certain  attitude  of  dignity,  which  he 
assumes  in  the  crisis  of  eloquence,  accompanied  with  a  flinging 
back  of  his  coat,  which  sets  his  periods  beautifully  off,  "  Hon- 
est Jack"  has  become  one  of  the  most  popular  and  efficient 
speakers  at  the  Association. 

Shortly  after  Mr.  Lawless  had  been  despatched,  a  great  rein- 
forcement to  the  oratorical  corps  was  sent  down  in  the  person 
of  the  celebrated  Father  Maguire,  or,  as  he  is  habitually 
designated,  "Father  Tom."  This  gentleman  had  been  for 
some  time  a  parish  priest  in  the  county  of  Leitrim.  He  lived 
in  a  remote  parish,  where  his  talents  were  unappreciated. 
Some  accident  brought  Mr.  Pope,  the  itinerant  controversialist, 
into  contact  with  him.  A  challenge  to  defend  the  doctrines  of 
his  religion  was  tendered  by  the  wandering  disputant  to  the 
priest,  and  the  latter  at  once  accepted  it.  Maguire  had  given 
no  previous  proof  of  his  abilities,  and  the  Catholic  body  re- 
gretted the  encounter.  The  parties  met  in  this  strange  duel 
of  theology.  The  interest  created  by  their  encounter  was 
prodigious.  Not  only  the  room  where  their  debates  were 
carried  on  was  crowded,  but  the  whole  of  Sackville  street, 
where  it  was  situated,  was  thronged  with  population.  Pope 
brought  to  the  combat  great  fluency,  and  a  powerful  declama- 
tion. Maguire  was  a  master  of  scholastic  logic.  After  several 
days  of  controversy,  Pope  was  overthrown,  and  "Father  Tom," 

own  clergy  to  be  paid  by  taxes,  levied  on  all  other  creeds.  For  the  promise! 
two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  pounds  was  a  small  sum  conrpared  with  tho 
millions  wrung  out  of  the  Catholics  by  the  Protestant  hierarchy  and  inferior 
clergy.— rM. 


2f8  clare  election. 

as  tlie  champion  of  orthodox)',  became  the  object  of  popular 
adoration.  A  base  conspiracy  was  got  np  to  destroy  his  moral 
character,  and  by  its  failure  raised  him  in  the  affection  of  the 
multitude.  He  had  been  under  great  obligations  to  Mr.  O'Con- 
nell,  for  his  exertions  upon  his  trial ;  and  from  a  just  sentiment 
of  gratitude,  he  tendered  his  services  in  Clare.  His  name 
alone  was  of  great  value;  and  when  his  coming  was  an- 
nounced, the  people  everywhere  rushed  forward  to  hail  the 
great  vindicator  of  the  national  religion.*  He  threw  fresh 
ingredients  into  the  caldron,  and  contributed  to  impart  to  the 
contest  that  strong  religious  character  which  it  is  not  the  fault 
of  the  Association,  but  of  the  Government,  that  every  contest 
of  the  kind  must  assume. 

*  The  Reverend  Thomas  Maguire  was  an  Irish  Catholic  priest,  a  dialectician 
of  great  power  and  ingenuity,  who,  shortly  hefore  the  election-struggle  in  Clare, 
had  greatly  distinguished  himself,  in  a  public  and  prolonged  discussion  with 
the  Reverend  Mr.  Pope,  a  Protestant  clergyman.  Mr.  Maguire,  who  accepted 
his  challenge,  was  scarcely  known  even  among  his  own  persuasion,  and  many 
apprehended  defeat,  not  from  any  weakness  of  his  cause,  but  from  a  belief  that 
its  champion,  unknown  and  untried,  was  unequally  opposed  to  a  practised 
polemic.  The  discussion,  which  took  place  in  Dublin,  excited  much  interest 
in  the  religious  world.  Each  controversialist  had  to  defend  three  articles  of 
his  own  and  to  assail  as  many  of  his  adversary's  faith.  To  the  surprise  of  all, 
Mr.  Maguire  proved  equal,  at  least,  to  his  more  practised  opponent.  As  usual, 
both  parties  claimed  the  honor  of  the  victory  —  at  all  events,  Mr.  Maguire  was 
admitted  to  have  most  distinguished  himself.  It  is  pleasant  to  add,  that  a  warm 
and  mutual  regard  between  Mr.  Maguire  and  Mr.  Pope  sprang  out  of  this  con- 
troversy. The  Orange  party  in  Ireland,  shortly  after  this  discussion,  did  not 
discourage,  if  they  did  not  assist,  a  conspiracy  which  was  got  up  to  destroy 
Mr.  Maguire's  private  and  clerical  character.  An  action  at  law  was  brought 
by  a  person  named  M'Gerratty,  to  recover  damages  for  the  seduction  of  his 
daughter  Ann,  by  the  Reverend  Thomas  Maguire.  The  young  woman  was 
examined  on  the  trial,  and  swore,  among  other  things,  that  Mr.  Maguire  had 
seduced  her  under  a  promise  of  marriage,  to  be  fulfilled  on  his  becoming  a  Prot- 
estant clergyman  !  The  jury,  coupling  this  improbability  with  serious  discrep- 
ancies in  her  evidence  as  to  the  subject-matter  of  the  suit,  with  her  demeanor 
in  the  witness-box,  and  with  strong  testimony  of  her  previous  bad  character, 
acquitted  Mr.  Maguire,  without  hesitation.  For  the  remaining  twenty  years  of 
his  life,  he  was  undisturbed  by  slander.  He  was  a  popular  preacher,  and  was 
often  called  upon  to  plead  in  aid  of  the  sacred  cause  of  charity.  He  died 
suddenly,  and  it  was  suspected  that  he  was  poisoned  by  two  of  his  own  servants, 
who  desired  to  appropriate  t  themselves  whatever  portable  property  he  wad 
possessed  of- — M. 


FATHER   TOM  MAGTJIRE.  2?9 

"Father  Tom"  was  employed  upon  a  remarkable  exploit. 
Mr.  Augustine  Butler,  the  lineal  descendant  of  the  famous  Sir 
Toby  Butler,  is  a  proprietor  in  Clare  :  he  is  a  liberal  Protest- 
ant, but  supported  Mr.  Vesey  Fitzgerald.  "Father  Tom" 
proceeded  from  the  town  of  Ennis  to  the  county  chapel  where 
Mr  Butler's  freeholders  were  assembled,  in  order  to  address 
them ;  and  Mr.  Butler,  with  an  intrepidity  which  did  him 
credit,  went  forward  to  meet  him.  It  was  a  singular  encounter 
in  the  house  of  God.  The  Protestant  landlord  called  upon  his 
freeholders  not  to  desert  him.  "Father  Tom"  rose  to  address 
them  in  behalf  of  Mr.  O'Connell.  He  is  not  greatly  gifted 
with  a  command  of  decorated  phraseology  ;  but  he  is  master 
of  vigorous  language,  and  has  a  power  of  strong  and  simple 
reasoning,  which  is  equally  intelligible  to  all  classes.  He 
employs  the  syllogism  of  the  schools  as  his  chief  weapon  in 
argument;  but  uses  it  with  such  dexterity,  that  his  auditors  of 
the  humblest  class  can  follow  him  without  being  aware  of  the 
technical  expedient  of  logic  by  which  he  masters  the  under- 
standing. His  manner  is  peculiar:  it  is  not  flowery,  nor  de- 
clamatory, but  is  short,  somewhat  abrupt,  and,  to  use  the 
French  phrase,  is  tranchant.  His  countenance  is  adapted  to 
his  mind,  and  is  expressive  of  the  reasoning  and  controversial 
faculties.  A  quick  blue  eye,  a  nose  slightly  turned  up,  and 
formed  for  the  tossing  off  of  an  argument,  a  strong  brow,  a 
complexion  of  mountain  ruddiness,  and  thick  lips,  which  are 
better  formed  for  rude  disdain  than  for  polisked  sarcasm,  are 
Ills  characteristics.  He  assailed  Mr.  Butler  with  all  his  powers, 
fend  overthrew  him.  The  topic  to  which  he  addressed  himself, 
was  one  which  was  not  only  calculated  to  move  the  tenants  of 
Mr.  Butler,  but  to  stir  Mr.  Butler  himself.  He  appealed  to  the 
memory  of  his  celebrated  Catholic  ancestor,  of  which  Mr. 
Butler  is  justly  proud.  He  stated,  that  what  Sir  Toby  Butler 
had  been,  Mr.  O'Connell  was  ;  and  he  abjured  him  not  to  stand 
up  in  opposition  to  an  individual,  whom  he  was  bound  to  sus- 
tain by  a  sort  of  hereditary  obligation.  His  appeal  carried  the 
freeholders  away,  and  one  hundred  and  fifty  votes  were  se- 
cured to  Mr.  O'Connell.  Mr.  Maguire  was  seconded  in  this 
achievement  by   Mr.  Dominick  Ronayne,   a  barrister  of  tho 


£S0  CLAIJE   ELECTION. 

Association,  of  considerable  talents,  and  who  not  only  speaks 
the  English  language  with  eloquence,  but  is  master  of  the  Irish 
tongue;*  and,  throwing  an  educated  mind  into  the  powerful 
idiom  of  the  country,  wrought  with  uncommon  power  upon  the 
passions  of  the  people. 

Mr.  Sheil  was  employed  as  counsel  for  Mr.  O'Oonnell  before 
the  assessor;  but  proceeded  to  the  county  of  Clare  the  day 
before  the  election  commenced.  On  his  arrival,  he  understood 
that  an  exertion  was  required  in  the  parish  of  Oorofin,  which 
is  situate  upon  the  estate  of  Sir  Edward  O'Brien,  who  had 
given  all  his  interest  to  Mr.  Vesey  Fitzgerald.  Sir  Edward 
is  the  most  opulent  resident  landlord  in  the  country .t  In  the 
parish  of  Oorofin  he  had  no  less  than  three  hundred  votes  ;  and 
it  was  supposed  that  his  freeholders  would  go  with  him.  Mr. 
Sheil  determined  to  assail  him  in  the  citadel  of  his  strength, 
and  proceeded,  upon  the  Sunday  before  the  poll  commenced, 
to  the  chapel  of  Oorofin.  Sir  Edward  O'Brien  having  learned 
that  this  agitator  intended  this  trespass  upon  his  authority, 
resolved  to  anticipate  him,  and  set  off  in  his  splendid  equipage, 
drawn  by  four  horses,  to  the  mountains  in  which  Oorofin  ig 
situated.  The  whole  population  came  down  from  their  resi- 
dences in  the  rocks,  which  are  in  the  vicinity  of  the  town  of 

*  The  Irish  are  fond  of  a  joke,  and  O'Connell  often  indulged  them.  In 
1843,  when  the  Monster  Meetings  were  proceeding,  the  Peel  Ministry  sent 
short-hand  writers  to  report  the  speeches  of  O'Connell  and  his  co-agitators. 
On  one  occasion,  seeing  "  the  gentlemen  of  the  press"  assembled  on  the  plat^ 
form,  ready  to  record  every  word  he  uttered,  O'Connell  called  out  to  know 
whether  they  had  every  facility  and  accommodation  necessary.  They  answered... 
truly,  that  everything  had  been  done  for  -their  ease  and  comfort.  It  was  in 
one  of  the  Southern  counties,  where  the  Irish  language  is  spoken  as  often  as  the 
English,  and  O'Connell,  glancing  waggishly  around,  commenced  a  speech  in 
Irish ,  to  the  surprise  and  dismay  of  the  "  Saxon"  reporters.  The  multitude 
instantly  entered  into  the  humor  of  the  joke,  and  shouts  of  laughter  mingled 
with  the  usual  applause.  It  was  a  great  triumph  thus  to  have  baffled  the  Gov- 
ernment through  its  reporters,  and  was  one  of  the  amusing  episodes  of  a  period 
of  great  pci'sonal  and  political  excitement. —  M. 

|-  Sir  E.  O'Brien,  of  Drumoland,  County  of  Clare,  was  born  in  1773  and 
died  in  1837.  He  was  succeeded  in  his  title  by  his  eldest  son,  now  Sir  Lucius 
O'Brien.  His  second  son,  William  Smith  O'Brien,  late  M.  F.  for  Ennis,  is 
now  (January,  1854)  in  New  South  Wales,  as  a  transport  for  life,  un  ter  his 
conviction,  on  a  charge  of  high  treason,  in  1848. —  M. 


FATHER    MtJKPHY.  2Sl 

Ennis,  and  advanced  in  large  bands,  waving  green  boughs, 
and  preceded  by  fifes  and  pipers,  upon  the  road.  Their  land- 
lord was  met  by  them  on  his  way.  They  passed  him  by  in 
silence,  while  they  hailed  the  demagogue  with  shouts,  and 
attended  him  in  triumph  to  the  chapel.  Sir  Edward  O'Brien 
lost  his  resolution  at  this  spectacle  ;  and  feeling  that  he  could 
have  no  influence  in  such  a  state  of  excitation,  instead  of  going 
to  the  house  of  Catholic  worship,  proceeded  to  the  church  of 
Corofin.  He  left  his  carriage  exactly  opposite  the  doors  of  the 
chapel,  which  is  immediately  contiguous,  and  thus  reminded 
the  people  of  his  Protestantism,  by  a  circumstance  of  which, 
of  course,  advantage  was  instantaneously  taken. 

Mr.  Sheil  arrived  with  a  vast  multitude  of  attendants  at  the 
chapel,  which  was  crowded  with  people,  who  had  flocked  from 
all  quarters ;  there  a  singular  scene  took  place.  Father 
Murphy,  the  parish  priest,  came  to  the  entrance  of  the  chapel 
dressed  in  his  surplice.  As  he  came  forth,  the  multitude  fell 
back  at  his  command,  and  arranged  themselves  on  either  side, 
so  as  to  form  a  lane  for  the  reception  of  the  agitator.  Deep 
silence  was  imposed  upon  the  people  by  the  priest,  who  had  a 
voice  like  subterraneous  thunder,  and  appeared  to  hold  them 
in  absolute  dominion.  When  Mr.  Sheil  had  reached  the  thresh- 
old of  the  chapel,  Father  Murphy  stretched  forth  his  hand, 
and  welcomed  him  to  the  performance  of  the  good  work. 

The  figure  and  attitude  of  the  priest  were  remarkable.  My 
English  reader  draws  his  ordinary  notion  of  a  Catholic  clergy- 
man from  the  caricatures  which  are  contained  in  novels,  or 
represented  in  farces  upon  the  stage  ;  but  the  Irish  priest,  who 
has  lately  become  a  politician  and  a  scholar,  has  not  a  touch 
of  foigardism  about  him  ;  and  an  artist  would  have  found  in 
Father  Murphy  rather  a  study  for  the  enthusiastic  Macbriar, 
who  is  so  powerfully  delineated  in  "  Old  Mortality,"  than  a 
realization  of  the  familiar  notions  of  a  clergyman  of  the  Church 
of  Rome.  As  he  stood  surrounded  bv  a  dense  multitude,  whom 
he  had  hushed  into  profound  silence,  he  presented  a  most  im- 
posing object.  His  form  is  tall,  slender,  and  emaciated  ;  but 
was  enveloped  in  his  long  robes,  that  gave  him  a  peculiarly 
sacerdotal  aspect.     The  hand  which  he  stretched  forth  was 


$82  CLARE   ELECTION. 

ample,  but  worn  to  a  skinny  meagvitude  and  pallor.  His  face 
was  long,  sunken,  and  cadaverous,  but  was  illuminated  by 
eyes  blazing  with  all  the  fire  of  genius,  tlie  enthusiasm  of  reli- 
gion, and  the  devotedness  of  patriotism.  His  lank  black  hair 
fell  down  his  temples,  and  eyebrows  of  the  same  color  stretched 
in  thick  straight  lines  along  a  lofty  forehead,  and  threw  over 
the  whole  countenance  a  deep  shadow.  The  sun  was  shining 
with  brilliancy,  and  rendered  his  figure,  attired  as  it  was  in 
white  garments,  more  conspicuous.  The  scenery  about  him 
was  in  harmony;  it  was  wild  and  desolate,  and  crags,  with 
scarce  a  blade  of  verdure  shooting  through  their  crevices,  rose 
ever)  where  around  him.  The  interior  of  the  chapel,  at  the 
entrance  of  which  he  stood,  was  visible.  It  was  a  large  pile 
of  building,  consisting  of  bare  walls,  rudely  thrown  up,  with  a 
floor  of  clay,  and  at  the  extremity  stood  an  altar  made  of  a  few 
boards  clumsily  put  together. 

It  was  on  the  threshold  of  this  mountain-temple  that  the 
envoy  of  the  Association  was  hailed  with  a  solemn  greeting. 
The  priest  proceeded  to  the  altar,  and  commanded  the  people 
to  abstain,  during  the  divine  ceremony,  from  all  political  think- 
ing or  occupation.  He  recited  the  mass  with  great  fervency 
and  simplicity  of  manner,  and  with  all  the  evidences  of  unaf- 
fected piety.  However  familiar,  from  daily  repetition,  with 
the  ritual,  he  pronounced  it  with  a  just  emphasis,  and  went 
through  the  various  forms  which  are  incidental  to  it  with 
singular  propriety  and  grace.  The  people  were  deeply  atten- 
tive, and  it  was  observable  that  most  of  them  could  read  ;  for 
they  had  prayer-books  in  their  hands,  which  they  read  with  a 
quiet  devotion.  Mass  being  finished,  Father  Murphy  threw 
his  vestments  off,  and,  without  laying  down  the  priest,  assumed 
the  politician.  He  addressed  the  people  in  Irish,  and  called 
upon  them  to  vote  for  O'Oonnell  in  the  name  of  their  country 
and  of  their  religion. 

It  was  a  most  extraordinary  and  powerful  display  of  the 
externals  of  eloquence;  and,  as  far  as  a  person  unacquainted 
with  the  language  could  form  an  estimate  of  the  matter  by  the 
effects  produced  upon  the  auditory,  it  must  have  been  pregnant 
With  genuine  oratory.     It  will  be  supposed   that  this   singular 


FATHER    MURPHY'S    IRISH    SPEECH.  283 

priest  addressed  liis  parishioners  in  tones  and  gestures  as  rude 
as  the  wild  dialect  to  which  he  was  giving  utterance.  His 
action  and  attitudes  were  as  graceful  as  an  accomplished  actor 
could  use  in  delivering  the  speech  of  Antony,  and  his  intona- 
tions were  soft,  pathetic,  and  denunciatory,  and  conjuring, 
accordingly  as  his  theme  varied,  and  as  he  had  recourse  to  dif- 
ferent expedients  to  influence  the  people.  The  general  char- 
acter of  this  strange  harangue  was  impassioned  and  solemn  ; 
but  he  occasionally  had  recourse  to  ridicule,  and  his  counte- 
nance at  once  adapted  itself  with  a  happy  readiness  to  derision. 
The  finest  spirit  of  sarcasm  gleamed  over  his  features,  and 
shouts  of  laughter  attended  his  description  of  a  miserable 
Catholic  who  should  prove  recreant  to  the  great  cause,  by 
making  a  sacrifice  of  his  country  to  his  landlord.  The  close 
of  his  speech  was  peculiarly  effective.  He  became  inflamed 
by  the  power  of  his  emotions;  and  while  he  raised  himself 
into  the  loftiest  attitude  to  which  he  could  ascend,  he  laid  one 
hand  on  the  altar,  and  shook  the  other  in  the  spirit  of  almost 
prophetic  admonition,  and  as  his  eyes  blazed  and  seemed  to 
start  from  his  forehead,  thick  drops  fell  down  his  face,  and  his 
voice  rolled  through  lips  livid  with  passion  and  covered  with 
foam.  It  is  almost  unnecessary  to  say  that  such  an  appeal 
was  irresistible.  The  multitude  burst  into  shouts  of  acclama- 
tion, and  would  have  been  ready  to  mount  a  battery  roaring 
with  cannon  at  his  command.  Two  days  after  the  results 
were  felt  at  the  hustings  ;  and  while  Sir  Edward  O'Brien  stood 
aghast,  Father  Murphy  marched  into  Ennis  at  the  head  of  his 
tenantry,  and  polled  them  to  a  man  in  favor  of  Daniel  O'Con- 
ii ell.     But  I  am  anticipating. 

The  notion  which  had  gone  abroad  in  Dublin,  that  the 
priests  were  lukewarm,  was  utterly  unfounded.  With  the 
exception  of  Dean  O'Shaughnessy,  Avho  is  a  relative  of  Mr. 
Fitzgerald  (and  for  whom  there  is  perhaps  much  excuse),  and 
a  Father  Coffey,  who  has  since  been  deserted  by  his  congrega- 
tion, and  is  paid  his  dues  in  bad  halfpence,  there  was  scarcely 
a  clergyman  in  the  county  who  did  not  use  his  utmost  influence 
over  the  peasantry.  On  the  day  on  which  Mr.  O'Connell 
arrived,  you  met  a  Driest  in  every  street,  who  assured  you  that 


284  CLARE   ELECTION. 

the  battle  should  be  won,  and  pledged  himself  that  "  the  man 
of  the  people"  should  be  returned.  "  The  man  of  the  people" 
arrived  in  the  midst  of  the  loudest  acclamations.  Near  thirty 
thousand  people  were  crowded  into  the  streets  of  Ennis,  and 
were  unceasing  in  their  shouts.  Banners  were  suspended  from 
every  window,  and  women  of  great  beauty  were  everywhere 
seen  waving  handherchiefs  with  the  figure  of  the  patriot 
stamped  upon  them.  Processions  of  freeholders,  with  their 
parish  priests  at  their  head,  were  marching  like  troops  to  dif- 
ferent quarters  of  the  city  ;  and  it  was  remarkable  that  not  a 
single  individual  was  intoxicated.  The  most  perfect  order 
and  regularity  prevailed  ;  and  the  large  bodies  of  police  which 
had  been  collected  in  the  town  stood  without  occupation. 
These  were  evidences  of  organization,  from  which  it  was  easy 
to  form  a  conjecture  as  to  the  result. 

The  election  opened,  and  the  courthouse  in  which,  the 
Sheriff  read  the  writ  presented  a  very  new  and  striking 
scene.  On  the  left-hand  of  the  Sheriff  stood  a  Cabinet-minis- 
ter, attended  by  the  whole  body  of  the  aristocracy  of  the 
County  of  Clare.  Their  appearance  indicated  at  once  their 
superior  rank  and  their  profound  mortification.  An  expression 
of  bitterness  and  of  wounded  pride  was  stamped  in  various 
modifications  of  resentment  upon  their  countenances;  while 
others,  who  were  in  the  interest  of  Mr.  Fitzgerald,  and  who 
were  the  small  Protestant  proprietors,  affected  to  look  big  and 
important,  and  swelled  themselves  into  gentry  upon  the  credit 
of  voting  for  the  minister.  On  the  right-hand  of  the  Sheriff 
stood  Mr.  O'Connell,  with  scarcely  a  single  gentleman  by  his 
side;  for  most  even  of  the  Catholic  proprietors  had  abandoned 
him,  and  joined  the  ministerial  candidate.  But  the  body  of 
the  Court  presented  the  power  of  Mr.  O'Connell  in  a  mass  of 
determined  peasants,  among  whom  black  coats  and  sacerdotal 
visages  were  seen  felicitously  intermixed,  outside  the  balus- 
trade of  the  gallery  on  the  left-hand  of  the  Sheriff. 

Before  the  business  began,  a  gentleman  was  observed  on 
whom  every  eye  was  turned.  He  had  indeed  chosen  a  most 
singular  position  ;  for,  instead  of  sitting  like  the  other  auditors 
on  the  seats  in  the  gallery,  he  leaped  over  it,  and,  suspending 


THE   HIGH-SHERIFF.  285 

himself  above  the  crowd,  afforded  what  was  an  object  of  won- 
der to  the  great  body  of  the  spectators,  and  of  indignation  to 
the  High-Sheriff.  The  attire  of  the  individual  who  was  thus 
perched  in  this  dangerous  position  was  sufficiently  strange. 
He  had  a  coat  of  Irish  tabinet,  with  glossy  trousers  of  the 
same  national  material;  he  wore  no  waistcoat ;  a  blue  shirt, 
lined  with  streaks  of  white,  was  open  at  his  neck,  in  which  the 
strength  of  Hercules  and  the  symmetry  of  Antinous  were  com- 
bined; a  broad  green  sash,  with  a  medal  of  "the  order  of 
Liberators"  at  the  end  of  it,  hung  conspicuously  over  his 
breast ;  and  a  profusion  of  black  curls,  curiously  festooned 
about  his  temples,  shadowed  a  very  handsome  and  expressive 
countenance,  a  great  part  of  which  was  occupied  by  whiskers 
of  a  busy  amplitude.  "  Who,  sir,  are  you?"  exclaimed  the 
High-Sheriff,  in  a  tone  of  imperious  melancholy,  which  he  had 
acquired  at  Canton,  where  he  had  long  resided  in  the  service 
of  the  East  India  Company. 

But  I  must  pause  here,  and  even  at  the  hazard  of  breaking 
the  regular  thread  of  the  narration  —  I  can  not  resist  the 
temptation  of  describing  the  High-Sheriff.  When  he  stood  up 
with  his  wand  of  office  in  his  hand,  the  contrast  between  him 
and  the  aerial  gentleman  whom  he  was  addressing  was  to  the 
highest  ilegree  ludicrous.  Of  the  latter  some  conception  has 
already  been  given.  He  looked  a  chivalrous  dandy,  who, 
under  the  most  fantastical  apparel,  carried  the  spirit  and  intre- 
pidity of  an  exceedingly  fine  fellow.  Mr.  High-Sheriff  had, 
at  an  early  period  of  his  life,  left  his  native  county  of  Clare, 
and  had  migrated  to  China,  where,  if  I  may  judge  from  his 
manners  and  demeanor,  he  must  have  been  in  immediate  com- 
munication with  a  Mandarin  of  the  first  class,  and  made  a 
Chinese  functionary  his  favorite  model.  I  should  conjecture 
that  he  must  long  have  presided  over  the  packing  of  Bohea, 
and  that  some  tincture  of  that  agreeable  vegetable  had  been 
infused  into  his  complexion.  An  oriental  sedateness  and 
gravity  are  spread  over  a  countenance  upon  which  a  smile 
seldom  presumes  to  trespass.  He  gives  utterance  to  intona- 
tions which  were  originally  contracted  in  the  East,  out  have 
'been  since  melodized  by  his  religious  habits  into  a  puritanical 


%$6  CLARE    ELECTION. 

chant  in  Ireland.  The  Chinese  language  i»  monosyllabic,  and 
Mr  Molony  has  extended  its  character  to  the  English  tongue; 
for  he  breaks  all  his  words  into  separate  and  elaborate  divisions, 
to  each  of  which  he  bestows  a  due  quantity  of  deliberate  into- 
nation. Upon  arriving  in  Ireland,  he  addicted  himself  to 
godliness,  having  previously  made  great  gains  in  China,  and 
he  has  so  contrived  as  to  impart  the  cadences  of  Wesley  to  the 
pronunciation  of  Confucius. 

Such  was  the  aspect  of  the  great  public  functionary,  who, 
rising  with  a  peculiar  magisteriality  of  altitude,  and  stretching 
forth  the  emblem  of  his  power,  inquired  of  the  gentleman  who 
was  suspended  from  the  gallery  who  he  was.  "  My  name 
is  O'Gorman  Mahon,"  was  the  reply,  delivered  with  a  firmness 
which  clearly  showed  that  the  person  who  had  conveyed  this 
piece  of  intelligence  thought  very  little  of  a  High-Sheriff  and 
a  great  deal  of  O'Gorman  Mahon.  The  Sheriff  had  been 
offended  by  the  general  appearance  of  Mr.  Mahon,  who  had 
distracted  the  public  attention  from  his  own  contemplation; 
but  he  was  particularly  irritated  by  observing  the  insurgent 
symbol  of  "  the  Order  of  Liberators"  dangling  at  his  breast.* 
"I  tell  that  gentleman,"  said  Mr.  Molony,  "to  take  off  that 
badge."  There  was  a  moment's  pause,  and  then  the  following 
answer  was  slowly  and  articulately  pronounced:  "This  gen- 
tleman" (laying  his  hand  on  his  breast)  "  tells  that  gentleman" 
(pointing  with  the  other  to  the  Sheriff)  "  that  if  that  gentleman 
presumes  to  touch  this  gentleman,  this  gentleman  will  defend 
himself  against  that  gentleman,  or  any  other  gentleman,  while 
he  has  got  the  arm  of  a  gentleman  to  protect  him."     This  ex- 

*  The  Order  of  Liberators  arose  out  of  the  contested  election  for  the  county 
of  Waterford,  in  1826,  when  Mr.  Villiers  Stuart  (subsequently  raised  to  the 
peerage)  defeated  Lord  George  Beresford,  brother  to  the  Marquis  of  Waterford. 
The  forty-shilling  freeholders  having  thus  beaten  down  what  was  called  "  the 
Beresford  tyranny,"  O'Connell  instituted  the  Order  of  Liberators,  of  which  he 
was  Grand-Master,  to  commemorate  the  patriot'c  deed.  Whoever,  being  of 
good  character,  had  rendered  a  service  to  Ireland,  was  entitled  to  wear  tho 
medal,  attached  to  a  broad  green  riband.  After  Clare  Election,  it  was  resolved, 
at  a  Chapter  of  the  Order,  over  which  Mr.  Lawless  presided,  that  four  thou- 
sand medals  should  be  struck,  for  the  purpose  of  distribution  among  the  liberal 
^lectors  of  Clare.  —  M. 


SMITH   O'BRIEN.  2SY 

traordinary  sentence  was  followed  by  a  loud  burst  of  applause 
from  all  parts  of  the  courthouse.  The  High-Sheriff  looked 
aghast.  The  expression  of  self-satisfaction  and  magisterial 
complacency  passed  off  of  his  visage,  and  he  looked  utterly 
olank  and  dejected.  After  an  interval  of  irresolution,  down 
he  sat.  "  The  soul"  of  O'Gorman  Mahon  (to  use  Curran's  ex- 
pression) "walked  forth  in  its  own  majesty;"  he  looked  "re- 
deemed, regenerated,  and  disenthralled."  The  medal  of  "  the 
Order  of  Liberators"  was  pressed  to  his  heart.  O'Connell  sur- 
veyed him  with  gratitude  and  admiration  ;  and  the  first  blow 
was  struck,  which  sent  dismay  into  the  heart  of  the  party  of 
which  the  Sheriff  was  considered  to  be  an  adherent. 

This  was  the  opening  incident  of  this  novel  drama.  When 
the  sensation  which  it  had  created  had  in  some  degree  sub 
sided,  the  business  of  the  day  went  on.  Sir  Edward  O'Brien 
proposed  Mr.  Vesey  Fitzgerald  as  a  proper  person  to  serve  in 
Parliament.  Sir  Edward  had  upon  a  former  occasion  been  the 
vehement  antagonist  of  Mr.  Fitzgerald,  and  in  one  instance  a 
regular  battle  had  been  fought  between  the  tenantry  of  both 
parties.  It  Avas  supposed  that  this  feud  had  left  some  acrimo- 
nious feelings  which  were  not  quite  extinct  behind,  and  many 
conjectured  that  the  zeal  of  Sir  Edward  in  favor  of  his  competi- 
tor was  a  little  feigned.  This  notion  was  confirmed  by  the 
circumstance  that  Sir  Edward  O'Brien's  son  (the  member  for 
Ennis)  had  subscribed  to  the  Catholic  rent,  was  a  member  of 
the  Association,  and  had  recently  made  a  vigorous  speech  in 
Parliament  in  defence  of  that  body.*     It  is,  however,  probable 

*  William  Smith  O'Brien,  of  Cahermoyle,  Clare  county,  second  son  of  the 
late  Sir  Edward  O'Brien,  was  born  on  October  17,  1803.  He  entered  Parlia- 
ment early,  and  soon  attached  himself  to  the  popular  cause.  His  ablest  speech 
in  Parliament  was  when  moving  for  an  inquiry  into  the  state  of  Ireland.  It 
was  a  clear  and  forcible  statement  of  Irish  grievances,  and  caused  a  prolonged 
and  exciting  discussion.  The  Repeal  agitation  of  1843-'4  made  him  a  con- 
vert, and  he  took  his  seat  in  Conciliation  Hall  amid  much  applause,  as  his 
adhesion,  delayed  till  then,  was  evidently  caused  by  conviction.  While  O'Con- 
nell was  in  duresse,  under  illegal  verdict  and  judgment,  in  1844  his  place  in 
Conciliation  Hall  was  supplied  by  Smith  O'Brien,  who  announced  that,  having 
abandoned  all  hope  of  "justice  to  Ireland"  from  the  British  Parliament,  ho 
withdrew  from  regular  attendance  in  the  House  of  Commons,  and  would  now 


288  CLARE   ELECTION. 

that  the  feudal  pride  of  Sir  Edward  O'Brien,  which  was  deeply 
mortified  by  the  defection  of  his  vassals,  absorbed  every  other 
feeling,  and  that,  however  indifferent  he  might  have  been  on 
Mr.  Fitzgerald's  account,  yet  that  he  was  exceedingly  irritated 
upon  his  own.  He  appeared  at  least  to  be  profoundly  moved, 
and  had  not  spoken  above  a  few  minutes  when  tears  fell  from 
his  eyes.  He  has  a  strong  Irish  character  impressed  upon  him. 
It  is  said  that  he  is  lineally  descended  from  the  Irish  emperor, 
Brian-Borne  ;  and  indeed  he  has  some  resemblance  to  the  sign- 
post at  a  tavern  near  Olontarf,  in  Avhich  the  image  of  that  cel- 
ebrated monarch  is  represented.  He  is  squat,  bluff,  and  impas- 
sioned. An  expression  of  good-nature,  rather  than  of  good- 
humor,  is  mixed  up  with  a  certain  rough  consciousness  of  his 
own  dignity,  which  in  his  most  familiar  moments  he  never 
lays  aside,  for  the  Milesian  predominates  in  his  demeanor,  and 
his  royal  recollections  wait  perpetually  upon  him.  He  is  a 
great  favorite  with  the  people,  who  are  attached  to  the  descend- 
ants of  the  ancient  indigenous  families  of  the  county,  and  who 
see  in  Sir  Edward  O'Brien  a  good  landlord,  as  well  as  the  rep- 
resentative of  Brian  Borue. 

I  was  not  a  little  astonished  at  seeing  him  weep  upon  the 
hustings.  It  was,  however,  observed  to  me  that  he  is  given  to 
the  "  melting  mood,"  although  his  tears  do  not  fall  like  the 
gum  of  "  the  Arabian  tree."  In  the  House  of  Commons  he 
once  produced  a  great  effect,  by  bursting  into  tears,  while  he 
described  the  misery  of  the  people  of  Clare,  although,  at  the 

apply  his  energies  to  the  attainment  of  a  domestic  legislature  for  Ireland.  In 
1816,  still  declining  to  attend,  he  refused  to  serve  on  a  railway  committee,  and 
was  committed  to  confinement  by  the  House  of  Commons  for  "  contempt." 
After  a  time  he  was  liberated,  but  without  any  concession  on  his  part.  In 
1848,  having  ardently  adopted  "  physical  force"  principles,  he  unsuccessfully 
attempted  to  liberate  Ireland  from  legislative  connection  with  Great  Britain  : 
was  appiehended,  committed,  and  tried  for  high-treason;  convicted,  sentenced 
to  death  (for  which  transportation  for  life  was  substituted),  and  hurriedly  de- 
ported to  Van  Dieman's  Land,  the  very  worst  of  the  penal  settlements,  and 
commonly  called  "  Hell-upon-earth,"  and  is  now  (January,  1854)  a  "  convict" 
there.  Marked  ability  and  the  purest  motives  have  always  distinguished  this 
man,  who  loved  Ireland  "not  wisely"  (under  acts  of  Parliament),  "but  too 
well."  — M. 


VESEY   FITZGERALD.  289 

same  time,  Ills  granaries  were  full.  It  was  said  that  Lis  hust- 
ings pathos  was  of  the  same  quality,  and  arose  from  the  pecu- 
liar susceptibility  of  the  lacrymatory  nerves,  and  not  from  any 
very  nice  fibres  about  the  heart :  still  I  am  convinced  that  his 
emotion  was  genuine,  and  that  he  was  profoundly  touched. 
He  complained  that  he  had  been  deserted  by  his  tenants,  al- 
though he  had  deserved  well  at  their  hands  ;  and  exclaimed  that 
the  country  was  not  one  fit  for  a  gentleman  to  reside  in,  when 
property  lost  all  its  influence,  and  things  were  brought  to  such 
a  pass.  The  motion  was  seconded  by  Sir  A.  Fitzgerald  in  a 
few  words.*  Mr.  Gore,  a  gentleman  of  very  large  estate,  took 
occasion  to  deliver  his  opinions  in  favor  of  Mr.  Fitzgerald  ;  and 
Mr.  O'Gorman  Mahon  and  Mr.  Steele  proposed  Mr.  O'Connell. 
It  then  fell  to  the  rival  candidates  to  speak;  and  Mr. Vesey 
Fitzgerald,  having  been  first  put  in  nomination,  first  addressed 
the  freeholders.  He  seemed  to  me  to  be  about  five-and-forty 
years  of  age,  his  hair  being  slightly  marked  with  a  little  edg- 
ing of  scarcely-perceptible  silver,  but  the  care  with  which  it 
was  distributed  and  arranged  showed  that  the  Cabinet  Minis- 
ter had  not  yet  entirely  dismissed  his  Lothario  recollections.  I 
had  heard,  before  I  had  even  seen  Mr.  Fitzgerald,  that  he  was 
in  great  favor  with  the  Calistas  at  Almack's ;  and  I  was  not 
surprised  at  it,  on  a  minute  inspection  of  his  aspect  and  deport- 
ment. It  is  not  that  he  is  a  handsome  man  (though  he  is  far 
from  being  the  reverse),  but  that  there  is  an  air  of  blended 
sweetness  and  assurance,  of  easy  intrepidity  and  gentle  grace- 
fulness about  him,  which  are  considered  to  be  eminently  win- 
ning. His  countenance,  though  too  fully  circular,  and  a  little 
tinctured  with  vermilion,  is  agreeable.  The  eyes  are  of  bright 
hazel,  and  have  an  expression  of  ever-earnest  frankness,  which 
an  acute  observer  might  suspect,  while  his  mouth  is  full  of  a 
strenuous  solicitude  to  please.  The  moment  he  rose,  I  per- 
ceived that  he  was  an  accomplished  gentleman  ;  and,  when  I 
had  heard  him  utter  a  few  sentences,  I  was  satisfied  that  he 
was  a  most  accomplished  speaker. 

*  Sir  Augustus  Fitzgerald,  of  Newmarket-on-Fergus,  county  of  Clare,  a 
Lieutenant-General  in  the  army,  was  created  Baronet  in  1821,  and  died  in 
1834.  — M. 

Vol.  II.  — 13 


290  CLARE    ELECTION. 

He  delivered  one  of  the  most  effective  and  dexterous  speeches 
which  it  has  ever  been  my  good  fortune  to  hear.  There  were 
evident  marks  of  deep  pain  and  of  fear  to  be  traced  in  his  fea- 
tures, which  were  not  free  from  the  haggardness  of  many  an 
anxious  vigil ;  but  though  he  was  manifestly  mortified  in  the 
extreme,  he  studiously  refrained  from  all  exasperating  senti- 
ment or  expression.  He  spoke  at  first  with  a  graceful  melan- 
choly, rather  than  a  tone  of  impassioned  adjuration.'  He  inti- 
mated that  it  was  rather  a  measure  of  rigorous,  if  not  unjustifi- 
able policy,  to  display  the  power  of  the  Association  in  throwing 
an  individual  out  of  Parliament  who  had  been  the  warm  and 
uniform  advocate  of  the  Catholic  cause  during  his  whole  politi- 
cal life.  He  enumerated  the  instances  in  which  he  had  ex- 
erted himself  in  behalf  of  that  body  which  were  now  dealing 
with  him  with  such  severity,  and  referred  to  his  services  with 
regard  to  the  College  of  Maynooth. 

The  part  of  his  speech  which  was  most  powerful  related  to 
his  father.  The  latter  had  opposed  the  Union,  and  had  many 
claims  upon  the  national  gratitude.  The  topic  was  one  which 
required  to  be  most  delicately  touched,  and  no  orator  could 
treat  it  with  a  more  exquisite  nicety  than  Mr.  Fitzgerald.  He 
became,  as  he  advanced,  and  the  recollection  of  his  father 
pressed  itself  more  immediately  upon  his  mind,  more  impas- 
sioned. At  the  moment  he  was  speaking,  his  father,  to  whom 
he  is  most  tenderly  attached,  and  by  whom  he  is  most  beloved, 
was  lying  upon  a  bed  whence  it  was  believed  that  he  would 
never  rise  ;  and  efforts  had  been  made  to  conceal  from  the  old 
man  the  contest  in  which  his  son  was  involved.*  It  is  impos- 
sible to  mistake  genuine  grief;  and  when  Mr.  Fitzgerald  paused 
for  an  instant,  and,  turning  away,  wiped  off  the  tears  that  came 
streaming  from  his  eyes,  he  won  the  sympathies  of  every  one 
about  him.  There  were  few  who  did  not  give  the  same  evi- 
dence of  emotion;  and  when  he  sat  down,  although  the  great 
majority  of  the  audience  were  strongly  opposed  to  him,  and 
were  enthusiasts  in  favor  of  the  rival  candidate,  a  loud  and 
unanimous  burst  of  acclamation  shook  the  courthouse. 

*  The  Right  Honorable  James  Fitzgerald,  who  sacrificed  place  and  its  emol- 
uments for  his  country,  died  in  1835,  aged  ninety-three.  —  M. 


o'CONNELl/s   SPEECH.  291 

Mr.  O'Oonnell  rose  to  address  the  people  in  reply*  It  was 
manifest  that  lie  considered  a  great  exertion  to  be  requisite  in 
order  to  do  away  the  impression  which  his  antagonist  had 
produced.  It  was  clear  that  he  was  collecting  all  his  might, 
to  those  who  were  acquainted  with  the  workings  of  his  physi- 
ognomy. Mr.  O'Oonnell  bore  Mr.  Fitzgerald  no  sort  of  per- 
sonal aversion,  but  he  determined,  in  this  exigency,  to  have 
little  mercy  on  his  feelings,  and  to  employ  all  the  power  of 
vituperation  of  which  he  was  possessed,  against  him.  This 
was  absolutely  necessary  ;  for  if  mere  dexterous  fencing  had 
been  resorted  to  by  Mr.  O'Oonnell,  many  might  have  gone 
away  with  the  opinion  that,  after  all,  Mr.  Fitzgerald  had  been 
thanklessly  treated  by  the  Catholic  body.  It  was  therefore 
disagreeably  requisite  to  render  him,  for  the  moment,  odious. 
Mr.  O'Oonnell  began  by  awakening  the  passions  of  the  multi- 
tude in  an  attack  on  Mr.  Fitzgerald's  allies.  Mr.  Gore  had 
lauded  him  highly.  This  Mr.  Gore  is  of  Oromwellian  descent, 
and  the  people  detest  the  memory  of  the  Protector  to  this  day. 
There  is  a  tradition  (I  know  not  whether  it  has  the  least 
foundation)  that  the  ancestor  of  this  gentleman's  family  was  a 
nailer  by  trade  in  the  Puritan  army.  Mr.  O'Oonnell,  without 
any  direct  reference  to  the  fact,  used  a  set  of  metaphors,  such 
as  "striking  the  nail  on  the  head" — "putting  a  nail  into  a 
coffin,"  which  at  once  recalled  the  associations  which  were 
attached  to  the  name  of  Mr.  Gore;  and  roars  of  laughter  as- 
sailed that  gentleman  on  every  side.  Mr.  Gore  has  the  char- 
acter of  being  not  only  very  opulent,  but  of  bearing  a  re- 

*  O'Connell's  personal  appearance  was  greatly  in  his  favor.  He  had  that 
massiveness  of  mould  which  the  populace  like  to  witness  in  one  who  aspires  to 
lead  them.  He  had  what  singors  call  a  chest-voice;  deep,  clear,  musical,  and 
audible  even  in  a  whisper.  At  the  Clare  Election,  in  1828,  he  was  in  his  fifty 
third  year.  Prince  Puckler  Muscau,  who  visited  Ireland  about  this  time,  thus 
described  the  Man  of  the  People,  in  his  Tour  of  a  German  Prince  :  "  Daniel 
O'Connell,  is  indeed,  no  common  man,  though  the  man  of  the  commonalty. 
His  exterior  is  attractive,  and  the  expression  of  intelligent  good  nature,  united 
with  determination  and  prudence,  which  marks  his  countenance,  is  extremely 
winning.  It  is  impossible  not  to  follow  his  powerful  arguments  with  interest: 
and  such  is  the  martial  dignity  of  his  carnage,  that  he  looks  more  like  a  gen 
«ral  of  Napoleon's  than  a  Dublin  advocate." — M. 


292  CLARE   ELECTION. 

gard  to  liis  possessions  proportioned  to  their  extent.  Nothing 
is  so  unpopular  as  prudence  in  Ireland  ;  and  Mr.  O'Connell 
rallied  Mr.  Gore  to  such  a  point  upon  this  head,  and  that  of 
his  supposed  origin,  that  the  latter  completely  sunk  under  the 
attack.  He  next  proceeded  to  Mr.  Fitzgerald,  and,  having 
drawn  a  picture  of  the  late  Mr.  Perceval,  he  turned  round  and 
asked  of  the  rival  candidate,  with  what  face  he  could  call 
himself  their  friend,  when  the  first  act  of  his  political  life  was 
to  enlist  himself  under  the  banners  of  "  the  bloody  Perceval." 
This  epithet  (whether  it  be  well  or  ill  deserved  is  not  the  ques- 
tion) was  sent  into  the  hearts  of  the  people  with  a  force  of 
expression,  and  a  furious  vehemence  of  voice,  that  created  a 
great  sensation  among  the  crowd,  and  turned  the  tide  against 
Mr.  Fitzgerald.  ''This  too,"  said  Mr.  O'Connell,  "is  the 
friend  of  Peel — the  bloody  Perceval,  and  the  candid  and 
manly  Mr.  Peel  —  and  he  is  our  friend  !  and  he  is  everybody's 
friend  !  The  friend  of  the  Catholic  was  the  friend  of  the 
bloody  Perceval,  and  is  the  friend  of  the  candid  and  manly 
Mr.  Peel!" 

It  is  unnecessary  to  go  through  Mr.  O'Connell's  speech.  It 
was  stamped  with  all  his  powerful  characteristics,*  and  galled 
Mr.  Fitzgerald  to  the  core.  That  gentleman  frequently  mut- 
tered an  interrogatory,  "Is  this  fair?"  when  Mr.  O'Connell 
was  using  some  legitimate  sophistication  against  him.  He 
seemed  particularly  offended  when  his  adversary  said,  "  I 
never  shed  tears  in  public,"  which  was  intended  as  a  mockery 
of  Mr.  Fitzgerald's  references  to  his  father.  It  will  be  thought 
by  some  sensitive  persons  that  Mr.  O'Connell  was  not  quite 
warranted  in  this  harsh  dealing,  but  he  had  no  alternative. 
Mr.  Fitzgerald  had  made  a  very  powerful  speech,  and  the 
effect  was  to  be  got  rid  of.     In  such  a  warfare  a  man  must  not 

*  When  O'Connell  said  that  he  "  was  the  best-abused  man  in  the  world," 
he  might  have  added  that  he  was  the  best-abusing.  However,  he  had  amide 
precedents,  one  of  which  now  occurs  to  me.  Sir  Archibald  Macdonald  (who 
was  Chief-Baron  of  the  English  Court  of  Exchequer,  from  1793  to  1813)  once 
told  Sir  Fletcher  Norton,  afterward  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Commons,  that  he 
was  "  a  lazy,  indolent,  evasive,  shuffling,  plausible,  artful,  mean,  confident, 
cowardly,  poor,  pitiful,  sneaking,  and  abject  creature."  This  was  in  Parlia- 
ment, where  the  decencies  of  speech  arc  supposed  to  be  observed  !  —  M, 


SWEARING   TO   GAIN   TIME.  298 

pause  in  the  selection  of  Lis  weapons,  and  Mr.  O'Connell  is 
not  the  man  to  hesitate  in  the  use  of  the  rhetorical  sabre. 

Nothing  of  any  peculiar  interest  occurred  after  Mr.  O'Con- 
n ell's  speech  upon  the  first  day.  On  the  second  the  polling 
commenced  ;  and  on  that  day,  in  consequence  of  an  expedient 
adopted  by  Mr.  Fitzgerald's  committee,  the  parties  were  nearly 
equal.  A  Catholic  freeholder  can  not,  in  strictness,  vote  at  an 
election  without  making  a  certain  declaration,  upon  oath,  re- 
specting his  religious  opinions,  and  obtaining  a  certificate  of 
his  having  done  so  from  a  magistrate.  It  is  usual  for  candi- 
dates to  agree  to  dispense  with  the  necessity  of  taking  this 
oath.  It  was,  however,  of  importance  to  Mr.  Fitzgerald  to 
delay  the  election;  and  with  that  view  his  committee  required 
that  the  declaration  should  be  taken*  Mr.  O'Oonnell's  com- 
mittee were  unprepared  for  this  form,  and  it  was  with  the 
utmost  difficulty  that  magistrates  could  be  procured  to  attend 
to  receive  the  oath.  It  was,  therefore,  impossible,  on  the  first 
day,  for  Mr.  O'Connell  to  bring  his  forces  in  the  field,  and  thus 
the  parties  appeared  nearly  equal.  To  those  who  did  not 
know  the  real  cause  of  this  circumstance,  it  appeared  ominous, 
and  the  O'Connellites  looked  sufficiently  blank;  but  the  next 
dny  everything  was  remedied.  The  freeholders  were  sworn 
en  masse.  They  were  brought  into  a  yard  enclosed  within  four 
walls.  Twenty-five  were  placed  against  each  wall,  and  they 
simultaneously  repeated  the  oath.  When  one  batch  of  swear- 
ers had  been  disposed  of,  the  person  who  administered  the 
declaration,  turned  to  the  adjoining  division,  and  despatched 
them.  Thus  he  went  through  the  quadrangle,  and  in  the 
course  of  a  few  minutes  was  able  to  discharge  one  hundred 
patriots  upon  Mr.  Fitzgerald. 

It  may  be  said  that  an  oath  ought  to  be  more  solemnly 
administered.     In  reply  it  is  only  necessary  to  observe,  that 

*  Formerly,  a  County  Election  might  occupy  15  days,  in  the  mere  polling-  of 
the  voters.  The  Reform  Bill  has  changed  that,  and  County  Elections  can  not 
now  last  more  than  two  days  (if  there  be  a  contest),  exclusive  of  the  day  on 
which  the  candidates  are  publicly  nominated,  and  that  on  which  the  Returning 
officer  declares  the  result  of  the  electoral  strife.  If  there  be  no  opposition  to 
the  candidate,  the  nomination,  candidate's  address,  and  declaration  of  the  elec- 
tion, need  not  occupy  an  hour.     I  have  soon  it  hurried  through  in  less  time. —  M. 


294  .     CLARE   ELECTION. 

the  declaration  in  question  related  principally  to  "  the  Pre- 
tender,"  and  when  "  the  legislature  persevere  in  compelling 
the  name  of  God  to  be  thus  taken  in  vain,"  the  ritual  becomes 
appropriately  farcical,  and  the  manner  of  the  thing  is  only 
adapted  to  the  ludicrous  matter  upon  which  it  is  legally 
requisite  that  Heaven  should  be  attested !  The  oath  which  is 
imposed  upon  a  Roman  Catholic  is  a  violation  of  the  first  pre- 
cept of  the  decalogue  !  This  species  of  machinery  having 
been  thus  applied  to  the  art  of  swearing,  the  effects  upon  the 
poll  soon  became  manifest,  and  Mr.  O'Oonnell  ascended  to  a 
triumphant  majority.  It  became  clear  that  the  landlords  had 
lost  all  their  power,  and  that  their  struggles  were  utterly 
hopeless.  Still  they  persevered  in  dragging  the  few  serfs 
whom  they  had  under  their  control  to  the  hustings,  and  in 
protracting  the  election.  It  was  Mr.  Fitzgerald's  own  wish, 
I  believe,  to  abandon  the  contest,  when  its  ultimate  issue  was 
already  certain  ;  but  his  friends  insisted  that  the  last  man 
whom  they  could  command  should  be  polled  out.  Thus  the 
election  was  procrastinated. 

In  ordinary  cases,  the  interval  between  the  first  and  the  last 
day  of  polling  is  monotonous  and  dull ;  but  during  the  Clare 
election  so  many  ludicrous  and  extraordinary  incidents  were 
every  moment  occurring,  as  to  relieve  any  attentive  observer 
from  every  influence  of  ennui.  The  writer  of  this  article  was 
under  the  necessity  of  remaining  during  the  day  in  the  Sheriff's 
booth,  where  questions  of  law  were  chiefly  discussed,  but  even 
here  there  was  much  matter  for  entertainment.  The  sheriff 
afforded  a  perpetual  fund  of  amusement.  He  sat  with  his 
wand  of  office  leaning  against  his  shoulder,  and  always  ready 
for  his  grasp.  When  there  was  no  actual  business  going  for- 
ward, he  still  preserved  a  magisterial  dignity  of  deportment, 
and  with  half-closed  eyelids,  and  throwing  back  his  head,  and 
forming  with  his  chin  an  obtuse  angle  with  the  horizon,  re- 
proved any  indulgence  in  illicit  mirth  which  might  chance  to 
pass  among  the  bar.  The  gentleman  who  were  professionally 
engaged  having  discovered  the  chief  foible  of  the  Sheriff, 
which  consisted  in  the  most  fantastical  notions  of  himself,  vied 
with  each  other  in  playing  upon  this  weakness.     "I  feel  that 


THE   FIRST   MAN   IN   THE   COUNTY.  295 

I  address  myself  to  tlie  first  man  of  the  county,"  was  the  usual 
exordium  with  which  legal  argument  was  opened.*  The 
Sheriff,  instead  of  perceiving  the  sneer  which  involuntarily 
played  round  the  lips  of  the  mocking  sycophant,  smiled  with 
an  air  of  Malvolio  condescension,  and  bowed  his  head.  Then 
came  some  noise  from  the  adjoining  booths,  upon  which  the 
Sheriff  used  to  start  up  and  exclaim,  "  I  declare  I  do  not  think 
that  I  am  treated  with  proper  respect  —  verily,  I'll  go  forth 
and  quell  this  tumult  —  I'll  show  them  I  am  the  first  man  in 
the  county,  and  I'll  commit  somebody."  With  that  "  the  first 
man  in  the  county,"  with  a  step  slightly  accelerated  by  his 
resentment  at  a  supposed  indignity  to  himself,  used  to  proceed 
in  quest  of  a  riot,  but  generally  returned  with  a  good-humored 

*  The  Sheriff's  powers  exceeded  those  of  the  Magistracy.  In  those  days,  nearly 
every  out-at-elbows  Protestant,  who,  like  Justice  Shallow,  could  write  himself 
"  in  any  bill,  warrant,  quittance,  or  obligation,  armigero,"  was  made  a  magis- 
trate, provided  he  had  the  requisite  amount  of  Ascendency  intolerance.  The 
vademecum  of  such  justices,  under  which  they  dispensed  law  indifferently  {very 
indifferently,  indeed),  was  MacNally's  "  Justice  of  the  Peace  in  Ireland," 
which,  with  adaptations  to  the  present  state  of  the  law,  is  yet  in  vogue  and  has 
long  been  to  magistrates  in  Ireland,  what  "  Burn's  JusticV  is  to  those  of  Eng- 
land. As  originally  published,  it  was  full  of  errors,  and  those  who  acted  on  it, 
often  found  themselves  drawn  into  lawsuits,  as  defendants.  "  What  could  make 
you  act  so?"  MacNally  would  ask.  "  Faith,  sir,  I  acted  on  the  advice  of  your 
own  book  !"  Not  much  taken  aback,  for  such  scenes  were  frequent,  MacNally 
would  say,  "As  a  human  work,  the  book  has  errors,  no  doubt  —  but  I  shall  cor- 
rect them  all  when  it  comes  to  a  second  edition!11 — Leonard  MacNally  was 
very  short  and  nearly  as  broad  as  long:  his  legs  were  of  unequal  length,  and 
he  had  a  face  which  no  washing  could  clean,  and  he  wanted  one  thumb.  He 
had  good  eyes  and  an  expressive  countenance.  He  was  lame,  also,  which 
made  Curran  say,  when  he  entered  the  lawyer's  corps,  in  1798,  that  he  ran  a 
chance  of  being  shot  for  disobedience  of  orders,  for  that  when  the  adjutant 
would  cry  "march,"  MacNally  would  certainly  "  halt ."'  When  he  walked 
rapidly,  he  would  take  two  thumping  steps  with  the  short  leg,  to  bring  up  the 
space  made  by  the  long  one,  and  from  this  the  bar  nicknamed  him  "  One  found 
two."  He  was  expelled  by  the  bar-mess,  on  account  of  the  dirtiness  of  his 
person.  Once  when  he  went  to  France  for  a  month,  Curran  said,  "  He  has 
faken  a  shirt  and  a  guinea,  and  he'll  change  neither  until  he  comes  back."  The 
well-known  song,  "  The  lass  of  Richmond  Hill"  was  written  by  MacNally  upon 
his  sweetheart,  a  Miss  Janson,  who  sympathized  with  him  in  scribbling  verses 
and  not  washing  her  hands.  They  were  married,  lived  happily,  and,  to  the  last, 
weie  economic  in  the  use  of  soap  !  —  M. 


^96  CLARE   ELECTION. 

expression  of  face,  observing:  "It  was  only  Mr.  O'Connell. 
and  I  must  say  when  I  remonstrated  with  him,  he  paid  me 
every  sort  of  proper  respect.  He  is  quite  a  different  person 
from  what  I  had  heard.  But  let  nobody  imagine  that  I  was 
afraid  of  him.  I'd  commit  him,  or  Mr.  Vesey  Fitzgerald,  if  I 
was  not  treated  with  proper  respect ;  for  by  virtue  of  my  office 
I  am  the  first  man  in  the  county."  This  phrase  of  the  Sheriff 
became  so  familiar,  that  a  set  of  wags,  who  in  the  intervals  of 
leisure,  had  set  about  practising  mimicry,  emulated  each  othei 
in  repeating  it,  and  succeeded  in  producing  various  pleasant 
imitations  of  the  "  first  man  in  the  county." 

A  young  gentleman  (Mr.  Nicholas  Whyte)  turned  this  talent 
to  a  very  pleasant  and  useful  account.  He  acted  as  agent  to 
Mr.  O'Connell,  in  a  booth  of  which  the  chief  officer,  or  Sheriff's 
Deputy,  as  he  is  called,  was  believed  to  be  a  partisan  of  Mr. 
Fitzgerald,  and  used  to  delay  Mr.  O'Connell's  tallies.  A  tu- 
mult would  then  ensue,  and  the  deputy  would  raise  his  voice 
in  a  menacing  tone  against  the  friends  of  Mr.  O'Connell.  The 
High-Sheriff  himself  had  been  accustomed  to  go  to  the  entrance 
of  the  different  booths  and  to  command  silence  with  his  long- 
drawn  and  dismal  ejaculations.  When  the  deputy  was  bearing 
it  with  a  high  hand,  Mr.  Whyte  would  sometimes  leave  the 
booth,  and  standing  at  the  outward  edge  of  the  crowd,  just  at 
the  moment  that  the  deputy  was  about  to  commit  some  parti 
san  of  Mr.  O'Connell,  the  mimic  would  exclaim,  in  a  death-bell 
voice,  "  Silence,  Mr.  Deputy,  you  are  exceedingly  disorderly 
—  silence!"  The  deputy  being  enveloped  by  the  multitude, 
could  not  see  the  individual  who  thus  addressed  him,  and  be- 
lieving it  to  be  the  Sheriff,  sat  down  confounded  at  the  admo- 
nition, while  Mr.  O'Connell's  tally  went  rapidly  on,  and  the 
disputed  vote  was  allowed. 

These  vagaries  enlivened  occupations  which  in  their  nature 
were  sufficiently  dull.  But  the  Sheriff's  booth  afforded  matter 
more  deserving  of  note  than  his  singularities.  Charges  of  un- 
due influence  were  occasionally  brought  forward,  which  exhib- 
ited the  character  of  the  election  in  its  strongest  colors. 

One  incident  I  particularly  remember.  An  attorney  em- 
ployed by  Mr.  Fitzgerald  rushed  in  and  exclaimed  that  a  priest 


FATHER   MURPHY   OF   COROFItf.  29? 

was  terrifying  the  voters.  This  accusation  produced  a  power- 
ful effect.  The  counsel  for  Mr.  O'Connell  defied  the  attorney 
to  make  out  his  charge.  The  assessor  very  properly  required 
that  the  priest  should  attend  ;  and  behold  Father  Murphy  of 
Corofin  !  His  solemn  and  spectral  aspect  struck  everybody. 
He  advanced  with  fearlessness  to  the  bar,  behind  which  the 
Sheriff  was  seated,  and  inquired  what  the  charge  was  which 
had  been  preferred  against  him,  with  a  smile  of  ghastly  deris- 
ion. "You  were  looking  at  my  voters,"  cries  the  attorney. 
"But  I  said  nothing,"  replied  the  priest,  "  and  I  suppose  that 
I  am  to  be  permitted  to  look  at  my  parishioners."  —  "Not  with 
such  a  face  as  that!"  cried  Mr.  Dogherty,  one  of  Mr.  Fitzger- 
ald's counsel.  This  produced  a  loud  laugh  ;  for,  certainly,  the 
countenance  of  Father  Murphy  was  fraught  with  no  ordinary 
terrors.  "And  this,  then,"  exclaimed  Mr. O'Oonnell's  counsel, 
"is  the  charge  you  bring  against  the  priests!  Let  us  see  if 
there  be  an  act  of  Parliament  which  prescribes  that  a  Jesuit 
shall  wear  a  mask."  At  this  instant,  one  of  the  agents  of  Mr. 
O'Connell  precipitated  himself  into  the  room,  and  cried  out, 
"  Mr.  Sheriff,  we  have  no  fair  play  —  Mr.  Singleton  is  frighten- 
ing his  tenants  —  he  caught  hold  of  one  of  them  just  now,  and 
threatened  vengeance  against  him."  This  accusation  came 
admirably  apropos.  "What!"  exclaimed  the  advocate  of  Mr. 
O'Connell,  "  is  this  to  be  endured  1  Do  Ave  live  in  a  free  coun- 
try, and  under  a  constitution?  Is  a  landlord  to  commit  a  bat- 
tery with  impunity,  and  is  a  priest  to  be  indicted  for  his  physi 
ognomy,  and  to  be  found  guilty  of  a  look?"  Thus  a  valuable 
set-off  against  Father  Murphy's  eyebrows  was  obtained.  After 
a  long  debate,  the  assessor  decided  that,  if  either  a  priest  or  a 
landlord  actually  interrupted  the  poll,  they  should  be  indis- 
criminately committed  ;  but  thought  the  present  a  case  only 
for  admonition.  Father  Murphy  was  accordingly  restored  to 
his  physiognomical  functions. 

The  matter  had  been  scarcely  disposed  of,  when  a  loud  shout 
was  heard  from  the  multitude  outside  the  courthouse,  which 
had  gathered  in  thousands,  and  yet  generally  preserved  a  pro- 
found tranquillity.  The  large  window  in  the  Sheriff's  booth 
gave  an  opportunity  of  observing  whatever  took  place  in  the 


298  CLARE   ELECTiOtf. 

square  below  ;  and,  attracted  by  the  tremendous  uproar,  every- 
body  ran  to  see  what  was  going  on  among  the  crowd.  The 
tumult  was  produced  by  the  arrival  of  some  hundred  freehold- 
ers from  Kilrush,  with  their  landlord,  Mr.  Vandeleur,  at  their 
head.  He  stood  behind  a  carriage,  and,  with  his  hat  off,  was 
seen  vehemently  addressing  the  tenants  who  followed  him. 
It  was  impossible  to  hear  a  word  which  he  uttered,  but  his 
gesture  was  sufficiently  significant :  he  stamped,  and  waved 
his  hat,  and  shook  his  clinched  hand.  While  he  thus  adjured, 
them,  the  crowd  through  which  they  were  passing  assailed 
them  with  cries:  "Vote  for  your  country,  boys!  vote  for  the 
old  religion  !  —  Three  cheers  for  liberty  !  —  Down  with  Vesey, 
and  hurra  for  O'Oonnell !"  These  were  the  exclamations  which 
rent  the  air  as  they  proceeded.  They  followed  their  landlord 
until  they  had  reached  a  part  of  the  square  where  Mr.  O'Con 
nell  lodged,  and  before  which  a  large  platform  had  been  erect- 
ed, which  communicated  with  the  window  of  his  apartment, 
and  to  which  he  could  advance  whenever  it  was  necessary  to 
address  the  people.  When  Mr.  Vandeleur's  freeholders  had 
attained  this  spot,  Mr.  O'Connell  rushed  forward  on  the  plat- 
form, and  lifted  up  his  arm.  A  tremendous  shout  succeeded, 
and  in  an  instant  Mr.  Vandeleur  was  deserted  by  his  tenants. 

This  platform  exhibited  some  of  the  most  remarkable  scenes 
which  were  enacted  in  this  strange  drama  of  "  The  Clare  Elec- 
tion." It  was  sustained  by  pillars  of  wood,  and  stretched  out 
several  feet  from  the^  wall  to  which  it  was  attached.  Some 
twenty  or  thirty  persons  could  stand  upon  it  at  the  same  time. 
A  large  quantity  of  green  boughs  were  turned  about  it,  and, 
from  the  sort  of  bower  which  they  formed,  occasional  orators 
addressed  the  people  during  the  day.  Mr.  M'Dermot,  a  young 
gentleman  from  the  county  of  Galway,  of  considerable  fortune, 
and  a  great  deal  of  talent  as  a  speaker,  used  to  harangue  the 
multitude  with  great  effect.  Father  Sheehan,  a  clergyman 
i'rom  Waterford,  who  had  been  mainly  instrumental  in  the 
overthrow  of  the  Beresfords,  also  displayed  from  this  spot  his 
eminent  popular  abilities.  A  Dr.  Kenny,  a  Waterford  surgeon, 
thinking  that  "  the  times  were  out  of  joint,"  came  "  to  set  them 
right  '     Father  Maguire,  Mr.  Lawless,  indeed  the  whole  com- 


A    SOLEMN    SCENE.  299 

pany  of  orators,  performed  on  this  theatre  with  indefatigable 
energy. 

Mirth  and  declamation,  and  anecdote  and  grotesque  deline- 
ation, and  mimicry,  were  all  blended  together  for  the  public 
entertainment.  One  of  the  most  amusing  and  attractive  topics 
was  drawn  from  the  adherence  of  Father  Coffey  to  Mr.  Fitz- 
gerald. His  manners,  his  habits,  his  dress,  were  all  selected 
as  materials  for  ridicule  and  invective  ;  and  pans,  not  the  less 
effective  because  they  were  obvious,  were  heaped  upon  his 
name.  The  scorn  and  detestation  with  which  he  was  treated 
by  the  mob  clearly  proved  that  a  priest  has  no  influence  over 
them  when  he  attempts  to  run  counter  to  their  political  pas- 
sions. He  can  hurry  them  on  in  the  career  into  which  their 
own  feelings  impel  them,  but  he  can  not  turn  them  into  another 
course.  Many  incidents  occurred  about  this  rostrum,  which, 
if  matter  did  not  crowd  too  fast  upon  me,  I  should  stop  to 
detail.  I  have  not  room  for  a  minute  narration  of  all  that 
was  interesting  at  this  election,  which  would  occupy  a  vol- 
ume, and  must  limit  myself  to  one,  but  that  a  very  striking 
circumstance. 

The  generality  of  the  orators  were  heard  with  loud  and 
clamorous  approbation  ;  but,  at  a  late  hour  one  evening,  and 
when  it  was  growing  rapidly  -dark,  a  priest  came  forward  on 
the  platform,  avIio  addressed  the  multitude  in  Irish.  There 
was  not  a  word  uttered  by  the  people.  Ten  thousand  peasants 
were  assembled  before  the  speaker,  and  a  profound  stillness 
hung  over  the  living  but  almost  breathless  mass.  For  minutes 
they  continued  thus  deeply  attentive,  and  seemed  to  be  struck 
with  awe  as  he  proceeded.  Suddenly  I  saw  the  whole  multi- 
tude kneel  down,  in  one  concurrent  genuflection.  They  were 
engaged  in  silent  prayer,  and  when  the  priest  arose  (for  he  too 
had  knelt  down  on  the  platform),  they  also  stood  up  together 
from  their  orison.  The  movement  was  performed  with  the 
facility  of  a  regimental  evolution.  I  asked  (being  unacquainted 
with  the  language)  what  it  was  that  had  occasioned  this  ex- 
traordinary spectacle;  and  was  informed  that  the  orator  had 
stated  to  the  people  that  one  of  his  own  parishioners,  who  had 
voted  for  Mr.  Fitzgerald,  had  just  died;   and  he  called  upon 


300  CLARE   ELECTION. 

the  multitude  to  pray  to  God  for  the  repose  of  his  soul,  and  the 
forgiveness  of  the  offence  which  he  had  committed  in  taking 
the  bribery  oath.  Money,  it  seems,  had  been  his  inducement 
to  give  his  suffrage  against  Mr.  O'Oonnell.  Individuals,  in 
reading  this,  will  exclaim,  perhaps,  against  these  expedients 
for  the  production  of  effect  upon  the  popular  passions.  Let  me 
observe  in  parenthesis,  that  the  fault  of  all  this  (if  it  is  to  be 
condemned)  does  not  lie  with  the  Association,  with  the  priest- 
hood, or  with  the  people,  but  with  the  law,  which  has,  by  its 
system  of  anomalies  and  alienations,  rendered  the  national 
mind  susceptible  of  such  impressions. 

Thus  it  was  the  day  passed,  and  it  was  not  until  nearly  nine 
o'clock  that  those  who  were  actively  engaged  in  the  election 
went  to  dinner.  There  a  new  scene  was  opened.  In  a  small 
room  in  a  mean  tavern,  kept  by  a  Mrs.  Oarmody,  the  whole 
body  of  leading  patriots,  counsellors,  attorneys,  and  agents, 
with  divers  interloping  partakers  of  election  hospitality,  were 
crammed  and  piled  upon  one  another,  while  Mr.  O'Connell  sat 
at  the  head  of  the  feast,  almost  overcome  with  fatigue,  but  yet 
sustained  by  that  vitality  which  success  produces.  Enormous 
masses  of  beef,  pork,  mutton,  turkeys,  tongues,  and  fowl,  were 
strewed  upon  the  deal-boards,  at  which  the  hungry  masticators 
proceeded  to  their  operations.  -For  some  time  nothing  was 
heard  but  the  clatter  of  the  utensils  of  eating,  interrupted  by 
an  occasional  hobnobbing  of  "  the  counsellor,"  who,  with  his 
usual  abstinence,  confined  himself  to  water. 

The  cravings  of  the  stomach  having  been  satisfied,  the  more 
intellectual  season  of  potations  succeeded.  A  hundred  tum- 
blers of  punch,  with  circular  slices  of  lemon,  diffused  the  essence 
of  John  Barleycorn  in  profuse  and  fragrant  steams.  Loud  cries 
for  hot  water,  spoons,  and  materials,  were  everywhere  heard, 
and  huge  jugs  were  rapidly  emptied  and  replenished  by  waiters, 
who  would  have  required  ubiquity  to  satisfy  all  the  demands 
upon  their  attention.  Toasts  were  then  proposed  and  speeches 
pronounced,  and  the  usual  "hip,  hip,  hurra  !"  with  unusual  ac- 
companiments of  exultation,  followed.  The  feats  of  the  day 
were  then  narrated  :  the  blank  looks  of  Ned  Hickman,  whose 
face  had  lost  all  its  natural  hilarity,  and  looked  at  the  election 


A   MODERN    TANTALUS.  30 J 

like  a  full  moon  in  a  storm ;  the  shroud-colored  physiognomy 
of  Mr.  Sampson ;  and  the  tears  of  Sir  Edward  O'Brien,  were 
alternately  the  subjects  of  merriment.  Mr.  Whyte  was  then 
called  upon  for  an  imitation  of  the  Sheriff,  when  he  used  to 
ride  upon  an  elephant  at  Calcutta.  But  in  the  midst  of  this 
conviviality,  which  was  heightened  by  the  consciousness  that 
there  was  no  bill  to  be  paid  by  gentlemen  who  were  the  guests 
of  their  country,  and  long  before  any  inebriating  effect  was 
observable,  a  solemn  and  spectral  figure  used  to  stride  in,  like 
the  ghost  of  Hamlet,  and  the  same  deep,  churchyard  voice 
which  had  previously  startled  my  ears,  raised  its  awful  peal, 
while  it  exclaimed  :  "  The  wolf,  the  wolf  is  on  the  walk  ! 
Shepherds  of  the  people,  what  do  you  here?  Is  it  meet  that 
you  should  sit  carousing  and  in  joyance,  while  the  freeholders 
remain  unprovided,  and  temptation,  in  the  shape  of  famine,  is 
among  them?  Arise,  I  say,  arise  from  your  cups  —  the  wolf, 
the  wolf  is  on  the  walk  !" 

Such  was  the  disturbing  and  heart-appalling  adjuration  of 
Father  Murphy  of  Oorofin,  whose  enthusiastic  sense  of  duty 
never  deserted  him,  and  who,  when  the  feast  was  unfinished, 
entered  like  the  figure  of  Death  which  the  Egyptians  employed 
at  their  banquets.  He  walked  round  the  room  with  a  meas- 
ured pace,  like  the  envoy  of  another  world,  chasing  the  revel- 
lers before  him,  and  repeating  the  same  dismal  warning  — 
"The  wolf,  the  wolf  is  on  the  walk!"  Nothing  was  com- 
parable to  the  aspect  of  Father  Murphy  upon  these  occasions, 
except  the  physiognomy  of  Mr.  Lawless. 

This  gentleman,  who  had  been  usefully  exerting  himself 
during  the  whole  day,  somewhat  reasonably  expected  that  he 
should  be  permitted  to  enjoy  the  just  rewards  of  patriotism  for 
a  few  hours  without  any  nocturnal  molestation.  It  was  about 
the  time  that  he  had  just  commenced  his  second  tumbler,  and 
when  the  exhilarating  influence  of  his  eloquent  chalices  was 
beginning  to  display  itself,  that  the  dismal  cry  was  wont  to 
come  upon  him.  The  look  of  piteous  despair  with  which  he 
surveyed  this  unrelenting  foe  to  conviviality,  was  almost  as 
ghastly  at  that  of  his  merciless  disturber;  and  as,  like  another 
Tantalus,  he  saw  the  draughts  of  pleasantness  hurled  away,  a 


302  CLARK   ELECTION. 

schoolmaster,  who  sat  by  him,  and  who  "  was  abroad"  during 
the  election,  used  to  exclaim  :  — 

"  A  labris  sitiens  fugientia  captat 

Flumina." 

It  was  in  vain  to  remonstrate  against  Father  Murphy,  who 
insisted  that  the  whole  company  should  go  forth  to  meet  "  the 
wolf  upon  the  walk." 

Upon  going  down  stairs,  the  lower  apartments  were  found 
thronged  Avith  freeholders  and  priests.  To  the  latter  had  been 
assigned  the  office  of  providing  food  for  such  of  the  peasants 
as  lived  at  too  great  a  distance  from  the  town  to  return  imme- 
diately home ;  and  each  clergyman  was  empowered  to  give 
an  order  to  the  victuallers  and  tavern-keepers  to  furnish  the 
bearer  with  a  certain  quantity  of  meat  and  beei  The  use  of 
whiskey  was  forbidden. 

There  were  two  remarkable  features  observable  in  the  dis- 
charge of  this  office.  The  peasant,  who  had  not  tasted  food 
perhaps  for  twenty-four  hours,  remained  in  perfect  patience 
and  tranquillity  until  his  turn  arrived  to  speak  "  to  his  rever- 
ence ;"  and  the  Catholic  clergy  continued  with  unwearied 
assiduity  and  the  most  amiable  solicitude,  though  themselves 
quite  exhausted  with  fatigue,  in  the  performance  of  this  neces- 
sary labor.  There  they  stayed  until  a  late  hour  in  the  morn- 
ing, and  until  every  claimant  had  been  contented.  It  is  not 
wonderful  that  such  men,  animated  by  such  zeal,  and  operating 
upon  so  grateful  and  so  energetic  a  peasantry,  should  have 
effected  what  they  succeeded  in  accomplishing. 

The  poll  at  length  closed  ;  and,  after  an  excellent  argument 
delivered  by  the  assessor,  Mr.  Richard  Keatinge,  he  instructed 
the  Sheriff  to  return  Mr.  O'Oonnell  as  duly  elected.* 

*  The  result  of  this  election,  was  that  the  Duke  of  Wellington  (who  a  few 
months  previously  had  declared  that  "  he  could  not  comprehend  the  possibility 
of  placing  Roman  Catholics  in  a  Protestant  legislature  with  any  kind  of  safety, 
and  whose  personal  knowledge  told  him,  that  no  King,  however  Catholic, 
could  govern  his  Catholic  subjects  without  the  aid  of  the  Pope")  became  con- 
vinced that  the  choice  lay  between  Catholic  Emancipation  and  Civil  war.  He 
preferred  the  former,  for  which  the  repeal  of  the  Test  Act,  in  the  previous  year, 
had  prepared  the  English  mind.  On  the  5th  February,  1829,  the  King's  speech, 
at  the  op  niing  of  the  Session  recommended  the  suppression  of  the  Catholic 


ITS    RESULTS.  303 

The  Courthouse  was  again  crowded,  as  upon  the  first  day, 
and  Mr.  Fitzgerald  appeared  at  the  head  of  the  defeated  aris- 
tocracy. They  looked  profoundly  melancholy.  Mr.  Fitzgerald 
himself  did  not  affect  to  disguise  the  deep  pain  which  he  felt, 
but  preserved  that  gracefulness  and  perfect  good  temper  which 
had  characterized  him  during  the  contest,  and  which,  at  its 
close,  disarmed  hostility  of  all  its  rancor.  Mr.  O'Oonnell  made 
a  speech   distinguished   by  just  feeling  and  good  taste,  and 

Association,  and  the  subsequent  consideration  of  Catholic  disabilities,  with  a 
view  to  their  adjustment  and  removal.  At  the  instance  of  Mr.  Sheil,  supported 
by  the  Catholic  Bishops,  the  Association  dissolved  itself.  Mr.  O'Connell,  who 
had  arrived  in  London,  to  take  his  seat  for  Clare,  as  a  Catholic  —  which  he 
contended  he  could  do  even  under  the  old  law  —  did  not  make  the  attempt,  fearful 
lest  it  should  embarrass  a  Government  determined,  however  tardily  and  by 
compulsion,  to  do  justice  to  Ireland.  The  Emancipation  Bill  became  the  law 
of  the  land,  after  much  angry  and  personal  discussion.  O'Connell  expected, 
as  did  the  public  at  large,  that  he  might  take  his  seat  under  the  new  law.  He 
presented  himself  at  the  bar  of  the  House  to  be  sworn,  but  declining  to  take 
the  old  oath  (which  declared  the  Catholic  faith  to  be  idolatrous),  was  directed 
by  the  Speaker  to  withdraw.  A  motion  that  he  should  take  the  new  oaths, 
which  were  framed  for  the  relief  of  Catholics,  was  negatived  —  on  the  ground 
that  Mr.  O'Connell  was  elected  under  the  old  system.  He  was  then  heard  at 
the  bar  of  the  House,  where  he  claimed  his  right  to  sit  and  vote,  under  the  Act 
of  Union  as  well  as  under  the  new  Relief  Bill.  When  the  form  of  oath  was 
again  handed  to  him,  he  again  refused  to  take  it,  saying  that  it  contained  one 
assertion  which  he  knew  to  be  not  true,  and  another  which  he  believed  to  be 
false.  It  was  decided  that  he  should  not  sit  without  taking  the  objectionable  oath 
—  thus  making  the  Emancipation  Act  have  an  ex  post  facto  operation.  A  new 
writ  was  issued  for  Clare.  O'Connell  again  presented  himself,  and  was  again 
elected  —  though  a  certain  Mr.  Toby  Glascock  started  from  Dublin  to  oppose 
him,  but  did  not  reach  Ennis  until  the  election  was  over.  On  this  re-election 
O'Connell  took  his  seat,  under  the  new  act,  and  it  was  felt,  even  by  the  bulk 
of  their  partisans,  that  Ministers  had  done  wrong  to  him,  insult  to  his  constitu- 
ents, and  injury  to  themselves,  by  refusing  to  extend  the  privileges  of  their  own 
statute  to  Mr.  O'Connell.  It  was  a  strange  way  to  conciliate  him,  and  thev 
soon  felt  his  power.  Such  a  man,  then  virtually  representing  five  millions  of 
Irish  Catholics,  and  endowed  with  rare  talents,  as  an  orator  and  a  lawyer, 
speedily  found  his  level  in  Parliament  —  and  that  was  with  the  ablest  and  the 
most  influential.  Smarting  under  the  sense  of  wrong,  in  this  instance  of  asking 
him  to.  swear  an  oath  which  the  Legislature  had  just  abrogated,  it  was  only 
natural,  when  the  opportunity  came,  that  O'Connell  should  be  found  vehement 
and  strong  against  Wellington  and  Peel.  They  had  sowed  the  wind  and  ho 
made  them  reap  the  whirlwind. —  M. 


304  CLARE   ELECTION". 

begged  that  Mr.  Fitzgerald  would  forgive  him,  if  lie  Lad  upon 
the  first  day  given  him  any  sort  of  offence.  Mr.  Fitzgerald 
came  forward  and  unaffectedly  assured  him  that  whatever  was 
said  should  be  forgotten.  He  was  again  hailed  with  universal 
acclamation,  and  delivered  a  speech  which  could  not  surpass, 
in  good  judgment  and  persuasiveness,  that  with  which  he  had 
opened  the  contest,  but  was  not  inferior  to  it.  He  left  an 
impression,  which  hereafter  will,  in  all  probability,  render  his 
return  for  the  County  of  Clare  a  matter  of  certainty  ;  and, 
upon  the  other  hand,  I  feel  convinced  that  he  has  himself  car- 
ried away  from  the  scene  of  that  contention  —  in  which  he  sus- 
tained a  defeat,  but  lost  no  honor  —  a  conviction  that  not  only 
the  interests  of  Ireland,  but  the  safety  of  the  empire,  require 
that  the  claims  of  seven  millions  of  his  fellow-citizens  should 
be- conceded.  Mr.  Fitzgerald,  during  the  progress  of  the  elec- 
tion, could  not  refrain  from  repeatedly  intimating  his  astonish- 
ment at  what  he  saw,  and  from  indulging  in  melancholy  fore- 
bodings of  the  events,  of  which  taese*  incidents  are  perhaps 
but  the  heralds.  To  do  him  Justine,  he  appeared  at  moments 
utterly  to  forget  himself,  and  to  ba  absorbed  in  the  melancholy 
presages  which  pressed  themselves  upon  him.  "  Where  is  all 
this  to  end  V  was  a  question  frequently  put  in  his  presence, 
and  from  which  he  seemed  to  shrink. 

At  the  close  of  the  poll,  Mr.  Sheil  delivered  a  speech,  in 
which  the  views  of  the  writer  of  this  article  were  expressed  ; 
and  as  no  faithful  account  of  what  he  said  upon  that  occasion 
appeared  in  the  London  papers,  an  extract  from  his  observa- 
tions will  be  justified,  not  by  any  merit  in  the  composition  as 
a  piece  of  oratory,  but  by  the  sentiments  of  the  speaker,  which 
appear  to  me  to  be  just,  and  were  suggested  by  the  scenes  in 
which  he  had  taken  a  part.  The  importance  of  the  subject 
may  give  a  claim  to  attention,  which  in  other  instances  the 
speaker  may  not  be  entitled  to  command.  He  spoke  in  the 
following  terms  :  — 

"I  own  that  I  am  anxious  to  avail  myself  of  this  opportu- 
nity to  make  reparation  to  Mr.  Fitzgerald.  Before  I  had  the 
honor  of  hearing  that  gentleman,  and  of  witnessing  the  mild 
and  conciliatory  demeanor  by  which  he  is  distinguished,  I  had 


sheil's  speech.  305 

in  another  place  expressed  myself  with  regard  to  his  political 
conduct,  in  language  to  which  I  believe  that  Mr.  Fitzgerald 
referred  upon  the  first  day  of  the  election,  and  which  was,  per- 
haps, too  deeply  tinctured  with  that  virulence  which  is  almost 
inseparable  from  the  passions  by  which  this  country  is  so 
unhappily  divided.  It  is  but  an  act  of  justice  to  Mr.  Fitzgerald 
to  say,  that,  however  we  may  be  under  the  necessity  of  op- 
posing him  as  a  Member  of  an  Administration  hostile  to  our 
body,  it  is  impossible  to  entertain  toward  him  a  sentiment  of 
individual  animosity  ;  and  I  confess  that,  after  having  observed 
the  admirable  temper  with  which  he  encountered  his  antag- 
onists, I  can  not  but  regret  that,  before  I  had  the  means  of 
forming  a  just  estimate  of  his  personal  character,  I  should  have 
indulged  in  remarks  in  which  too  much  acidity  may  have 
been  infused. 

"  The  situation  in  which  Mr  Fitzgerald  was  placed  was 
peculiarly  trying  to  his  feelings.  He  had  been  long  in  pos- 
session of  this  County.  Though  we  considered  him  as  an 
inefficient  friend,  we  were  not  entitled  to  account  him  as  an 
opponent.  Under  these  circumstances,  it  may  have  appeared 
harsh,  and  perhaps  unkind,  that  we  should  have  selected  him 
as  the  first  object  for  the  manifestation  of  our  power;  another 
would  have  found  it  difficult  not  to  give  way  to  the  language 
of  resentment  and  of  reproach  ;  but,  so  far  from  doing  so,  his 
defence  of  himself  was  as  strongly  marked  by  forbearance  as 
it  was  by  ability.  I  thought  it,  however,  not  altogether  impos 
sible  that,  before  the  fate  of  this  election  was  decided,  Mi 
Fitzgerald  might  have  been  merely  practising  an  expedient 
of  wily  conciliation,  and  that,  when  he  appeared  so  meek  and 
self-controlled  in  the  midst  of  a  contest  which  would  have  pro- 
voked the  passions  of  any  ordinary  man,  he  was  only  stifling 
his  resentment,  in  the  hope  that  he  might  succeed  in  appeasing 
the  violence  of  the  opposition  with  which  he  had  to  contend. 
But  Mr.  Fitzgerald,  in  the  demeanor  which  he  has  preserved 
to-day,  after  the  election  has  concluded  with  his  defeat,  has 
given  proof  that  his  gentleness  of  deportment  was  not  affected 
and  artificial;  and,  now  that  he  has  no  object  to  gain,  we  can 
jiot  but  give  him  as  ample  credit  for  his  sincerity,  as  we  must 


306  CLARE   ELECTION. 

give  him  for  that  persuasive  gracefulness  by  which  his  man- 
ners are  distinguished.  Justly  has  he  said  that  he  has  not 
lost  a  friend  in  this  country;  and  he  might  have  added,  that, 
so  far  from  having  incurred  any  diminution  of  regard  among 
those  who  were  attached  to  him,  he  has  appeased,  to  a  great 
extent,  the  vehemence  of  that  political  enmity  in  which  the 
associate  of  Mr.  Peel  was  not  very  unnaturally  held. 

"  But,  Sir,  while  I  have  thus  made  the  acknowledgment 
which  was  due  to  Mr.  Fitzgerald,  let  me  not  disguise  my  own 
feelings  of  legitimate,  but  not,  I  hope,  offensive  exultation,  at 
the  result  of  this  great  contest,  that  has  attracted  the  attention 
of  the  English  people  beyond  all  example.  I  am  not  mean 
enough  to  indulge  in  any  contumelious  vaunting  over  one  who 
has  sustained  his  defeat  with  so  honorable  a  magnanimity. 
The  victory  which  has  been  achieved  has  been  obtained,  not 
so  much  over  Mr.  Fitzgerald,  as  over  the  faction  with  which  I 
excuse  him,  to  a  great  extent,  for  having  been  allied.  A  great 
display  of  power  has  been  made  by  the  Catholic  Association, 
and  that  manifestation  of  its  influence  over  the  national  mind 
I  regard  as  not  only  a  very  remarkable,  but  a  very  momentous 
incident.  Let  us  consider  what  has  taken  place,  in  order  that 
we  may  see  this  singular  political  phenomenon  in  its  just  light. 
It  is  right  that  we  attentively  survey  the  extraordinary  facts 
before  us,  in  order  that  we  may  derive  from  them  the  moral 
admonitions  which  they  are  calculated  to  supply.  What  then 
has  happened  1  Mr.  Fitzgerald  was  promoted  to  a  place  in 
the  Duke  of  Wellington's  councils,  and  the  representation  of 
this  great  County  became  vacant.  The  Catholic  Association 
determined  to  oppose  him,  and  at  first  view  the  undertaking 
seemed  to  be  desperate.  Not  a  single  Protestant  gentleman 
could  be  procured  to  enter  the  lists,  and,  in  the  want  of  any 
other  candidate,  Mr.  O'Connell  stood  forward  on  behalf  of  the 
people.  Mr.  Vesey  Fitzgerald  came  into  the  field  encom- 
passed with  the  most  signal  advantages.  His  father  is  a  gen- 
tleman of  large  estate,  and  had  been  long  and  deservedly 
popular  in  Ireland.  Mr.  Fitzgerald  himself,  inheriting  a  por- 
tion of  the  popular  favor  with  a  favorite  name,  had  for  twenty 
years  been  placed  in  such  immediate  contiguity  with  power, 


SHEILAS    SPEECH.  SO? 

that  he  was  enabled  to  circulate  a  large  portion  of  the  influ- 
ence of  Government  through  this  fortunate  district.  There  is 
scarcely  a  single  family  of  any  significance  among  you  which 
does  not  labor  under  Mr.  Fitzgerald's  obligations.  At  this 
moment  it  is  only  necessary  to  look  at  him,  with  the  array  of 
aristocracy  beside  him,  in  order  to  perceive  upon  what  a  high 
position  for  victory  he  was  placed.  He  stands  encompassed 
by  the  whole  gentry  of  the  County  of  Clare,  who,  as  they 
stood  by  him  in  the  hour  of  battle,  come  here  to  cover  his 
retreat.  Almost  every  gentleman  of  rank  and  fortune  appears 
as  his  auxiliary ;  and  the  gentry,  by  their  aspect  at  this  instant, 
as  well  as  by  their  devotedness  during  the  election,  furnish  evi- 
dence that  in  his  person  their  own  cause  was  to  be  asserted. 

"To  this  combination  of  favorable  circumstances  —  to  the 
promising  friend,  to  the  accomplished  gentleman,  to  the  elo- 
quent advocate,  at  the  head  of  all  the  patrician  opulence  of 
the  county,  what  did  we  oppose  1  We  opposed  the  power  of 
the  Catholic  Association,  and  with  that  tremendous  engine  we 
have  beaten  the  Cabinet  Minister,  and  the  phalanx  of  aris- 
tocracy by  which  he  is  surrounded,  to  the  ground.  "Why  do  I 
mention  these  things?  Is  it  for  the  purpose  (God  forbid  that 
it  should)  of  wounding  the  feelings  or  exasperating  the  passions 
of  any  man  1  No  !  but  in  order  to  exhibit  the  almost  marvel- 
lous incidents  which  have  taken  place,  in  the  light  in  which 
they  ought  to  be  regarded,  and  to  present  them  in  all  their 
appalling  magnitude.  Protestants  who  hear  me,  gentlemen 
of  the  county  Clare,  you  whom  I  address  with  boldness,  per- 
haps, but  certainly  not  with  any  purpose  to  give  you  offence, 
let  me  entreat  your  attention.  A  baronet  of  rank  and  fortune, 
Sir  Edward  O'Brien,  has  asked  whether  this  was  a  condition 
of  things  to  be  endured ;  he  has  expatiated  upon  the  extraor- 
dinary influence  which  has  been  exercised  in  order  to  effect 
these  signal  results;  and,  after  dwelling  upon  many  other 
grounds  of  complaint,  he  has  with  great  force  inveighed  against 
the  severance  which  we  have  created  between  the  landlord  and 
tenant. 

"Let  it  not  be  imagined  that  I  mean  to  deny  that  we  have 
had  recourse  to  the  expedients  attributed  to  usj  on  the  con- 


308  clabe  election. 

trary,  I  avow  it.  We  Lave  put  a  great  engine  into  action, 
and  applied  the  entire  force  of  that  powerful  machinery  which 
the  law  has  placed  under  our  control.  We  are  masters  of  the 
passions  of  the  people,  and  we  have  employed  our  dominion 
with  a  terrible  effect.  But,  sir,  do  you,  or  any  man  here,  im- 
agine that  we  could  have  acquired  this  dreadful  ability  to  sun- 
der the  strongest  ties  by  which  the  different  classes  of  society 
are  fastened,  unless  we  found  the  materials  of  excitement  in 
the  state  of  society  itself?  Do  you  think  that  Mr.  Daniel 
O'Connell  lias  himself,  and  by  the  single  powers  of  his  own 
mind,  unaided  by  any  external  co-operation,  brought  the  coun- 
try to  this  great  crisis  of  agitation  1  Mr.  O'Connell,  with  all  his 
talents  for  excitation,  would  have  been  utterly  powerless  and 
incapable,  unless  he  had  been  allied  with  a  great  conspirator 
against  the  public  peace;  and  I  will  tell  you  who  that  con- 
federate is  —  it  is  the  law  of  the  land  itself  that  has  been  Mr. 
O'Connell's  main  associate,  and  that  ought  to  be  denounced 
as  the  mighty  agitator  of  Ireland.  The  rod  of  oppression  is 
the  wand  of  this  potent  enchanter  of  the  passions,  and  the 
book  of  his  spells  is  the  Penal  Code.*     Break  the  wand  of  this 

*  It  would  swell  these  notes  out  of  all  proportion  to  attempt  the  biographies 
of  such  men  as  the  Duke  of  Wellington.  He  was  in  the  Irish  Parliament  in  1790, 
and  voted  for  the  extension  of  civil  rights  to  the  Catholics.  The  year  after 
his  return  from  India  (in  1806),  he  was  appointed  Irish  Secretary  (his  eldest 
son,  the  present  Duke,  was  born,  in  Dublin,  in  1807),  and  did  not  resign  that 
office  until  1809,  when  his  active  service  in  the  Peninsula  sufficiently  occupied 
all  his  attention.  When  the  war  was  ended,  and  the  great  soldier  had  to  lay 
aside  his  sword,  he  adopted  the  Anti-Catholic  views  of  the  civilians  with  whom 
he  was  associated  in  the.  Government  of  the  country.  The  result  of  Clai'e  Elec- 
tion in  1828,  showed  him  that  concession  or  civil  war  must  ensue,  and  he 
wisely  adopted  the  former.     Thomas  Moore,  who  knew  that 

"  Peace  hath  her  victories,  no  less  than  War," 
introduced  into  one  of  his  Irish  Melodies,  an  address  to  Wellington,  as  pro 
phetic  as  poetical : — 

"  And  still  the  last  crown  of  thy  toils  is  remaining, 
The  grandest,  the  purest,  even  thou  hast  yet  known ; 
Though  proud  was  thy  task,  other  nations  unchaining, 
Far  prouder  to  heal  the  deep  wounds  of  thy  own. 
At  the  foot  of  that  throne,  for  whose  weal  thou  hast  stood, 
Go,  plead  for  the  land  that  first  cradled  thy  fame." 
Although  he  granted  what  they  desired,  the  Irish  Catholics  had  little  regard 


ME.    SHEILAS    SPEECH.  80$ 

political  Prospero,  and  take  from  him  the  volume  of  his  magic, 
and  he  will  evoke  the  spirits  which  are  now  under  his  control 
no  longer.  But  why  should  I  have  recourse  to  illustration 
which  may  he  accounted  fantastical,  in  order  to  elucidate  what 
is  in  itself  so  plain  and  obvious  1 

"  Protestant  gentlemen,  who  do  me  the  honor  to  listen  to  me, 
look,  I  pray  you,  a  little  dispassionately  at  the  real  causes  of 
the  events  which  have  taken  place  among  you.  I  beg  of  you  to 
put  aside  your  angry  feelings  for  an  instant,  and  believe  me 
that  I  am  far  from  thinking  that  you  have  no  good  ground  for 
resentment.  It  must  be  most  painful  to  the  proprietors  of  this 
county  to  be  stripped  in  an  instant  of  all  their  influence  ;  to 
be  left  destitute  of  all  sort  of  sway  over  their  dependents,  and 
to  see  a  few  demagogues  and  priests  usurping  their  natural 
authority.  This  feeling  of  resentment  must  be  aggravated  by 
the  consciousness  that  they  have  not  deserved  such  a  return 
from  their  tenants  ;  and  as  I  know  Sir  Edward  O'Brien  to  be 
a  truly  benevolent  landlord,  I  can  well  conceive  that  the  ap- 
parent ingratitude  with  which  he  was  treated,  has  added  to 
the  pain  which  every  landlord  must  experience;  and  I  own 
that  I  was  not  surprised  to  see  tears  bursting  at  his  eyes,  while 
his  face  was  inflamed  with  the  emotions  to  which  it  was  not  in 
human  nature  that  he  should  not  give  way.  But  let  Sir  Ed- 
ward O'Brien  and  his  fellow-proprietors,  who  are  gathered 
about  him,  recollect  that  the  facility  and  promptitude  with 
which  the  peasantry  have  thrown  off  their  allegiance,  are  ow- 
ing not  so  much  to  any  want  of  just  moral  feeling  on  the  part 
of  the  people,  as  to  the  operation  of  causes  for  which  the  peo- 

for  "The  Duke."  They  had  got  an  idea  that  he  had  denied  that  he  was  an 
Irishman,  and  this  was  strengthened,  in  1821,  by  his  not  accompanying  Geoige 
IV.  on  his  visit  to  Ireland.  The  Duke  of  Wellington  died,  September  14,  1852, 
aged  eighty-three. —  It  may  be  worth  mentioning  that  shortly  before  his  death, 
when  the  comparative  merits  of  modern  generals  were  discussed,  the  Duke 
said,  '*  The  greatest  man  of  the  lot,  is  Zachary  Taylor,  the  American.  In  sight 
of  the  Mexicans,  who  had  a  vast  superiority  of  men  and  artillery,  he  held  a 
council  of  war,  and  the  general  opiii.  »n  was  that  he  should  not  risk  a  contest. 
'Gentlemen,'  said  Taylor,  'I  adjourn  this  council,  until  tomorrow  —  after  the 
batlle?  He  won  the  battle  against  immense  odds,  and  had  great  courage  to 
run  the  riik,  against  advice.      That  was  a  true  commander." — M. 


310  CLARE   ELECTION. 

pie  are  not  to  blame.  In  no  other  country,  except  in  this, 
would  such  a  revolution  have  been  effected.  Wherefore1?  — 
Because  in  no  other  country  are  the  people  divided  by  the  law 
from  their  superiors,  and  cast  into  the  hands  of  a  set  of  men, 
who  are  supplied  with  the  means  of  national  excitement  by 
the  system  of  government  under  which  we  live. 

"  Surely  no  man  can  believe  that  such  an  anomalous  body  as 
the  Catholic  Association  could  exist,  excepting  in  a  commu- 
nity which  had  been  alienated  from  the  state  by  the  state  itself. 
The  discontent  and  the  resentment  of  seven  millions  of  the 
population  have  generated  that  domestic  government,  which 
sways  through  the  force  of  public  opinion,  and  uses  the  na- 
tional passions  as  the  instruments  for  the  execution  of  its  will. 
From  that  body  there  has  now  been  issuing,  for  many  years, 
a  continuous  supply  of  exciting  matter,  which  has  overflowed 
the  nation's  mind.  The  lava  has  covered  and  inundated  the 
whole  country,  and  is  still  flowing,  and  will  continue  to  flow, 
from  its  volcanic  source.  But,  if  I  may  so  say,  the  Associa- 
tion is  but  the  crater  in  which  the  fiery  matter  finds  a  vent, 
while  its  fountain  is  in  the  depth  of  the  law  itself.  It  would 
be  utterly  impossible,  if  all  men  were  placed  upon  an  equality 
of  citizenship,  and  there  was  no  exasperatiug  distinctions 
among  us,  to  create  any  artificial  causes  of  discontent.  Let 
men  declaim  for  a  century  with  far  higher  powers  than  any 
Catholic  agitator  is  endowed  with,  and  if  they  have  no  real 
ground  of  public  grievance  to  rest  upon,  their  harangues  will 
be  empty  sound  and  idle  air.  But  when  what  they  tell  the 
people  is  true  —  when  they  are  sustained  by  substantial  facts, 
then  effects  are  produced,  of  which  what  has  taken  place  at 
this  election  is  only  an  example.  The  whole  body  of  the  peo- 
ple being  previously  inflamed  and  rendered  susceptible,  the 
moment  any  incident,  such  as  this  election,  occurs,  all  the 
popular  passions  start  simultaneously  up,  and  bear  down  every 
obstacle  before  them.  Do  not,  therefore,  be  surprised  that  the 
peasantry  should  thus  at  once  throw  off  their  allegiance  to  you, 
when  they  are  under  the  operation  of  emotions  which  it  would 
be  wonderful  if  they  could  resist.  The  feeling  by  which  they 
are  now  actuated,  would  make  them  not  only  vote  against 


Mr.  sheilas  speech  §11 

their  landlords,  but  would  make  them  rush  into  the  field,  scale 
the  batteries  of  a  fortress,  and  mount  the  breach  j  and,  gentle- 
men, give  me  leave  now  to  ask  you,  whether,  after  a  due  re- 
flection upon  the  motives  by  which  your  vassals  (for  so  they 
are  accounted)  are  governed,  you  will  be  disposed  to  exercise 
any  measure  of  severity  in  their  regard  ? 

"I  hear  it  said,  that  before  many  days  go  by,  there  will  be 
many  tears  shed  in  the  hovels  of  your  slaves,  and  that  you 
will  take  a  terrible  vengeance  of  their  treason.  I  trust  in  God 
that  you  will  not,  when  your  own  passions  have  subsided,  and 
your  blood  has  had  to  cool,  persevere  in  such  a  cruel,  and,  let 
me  add,  such  an  unjustifiable  determination.  Consider,  gen- 
tlemen, whether  a  great  allowance  should  not  be  made  for  the 
offence  which  they  have  committed.  If  they  are,  as  you  say 
they  are,  under  the  influence  of  fanaticism,  I  would  say  to 
you,  that  such  an  influence  affords  many  circumstances  of  ex- 
tenuation, and  that  you  should  forgive  them,  'for  they  know 
not  what  they  do.'  They  have  followed  their  priests  to  the 
hustings,  and  they  would  follow  them  to  the  scaffold.  But 
you  will  ask,  wherefore  should  they  prefer  their  priests  to 
their  landlords,  and  have  purer  reverence  for  the  altars  of  their 
religion,  than  for  the  counter  in  which  you  calculate  your 
rents?  Ah,  gentlemen,  consider  a  little  the  relation  in  which 
the  priest  stands  toward  the  peasant.  Let  us  put  the  priest 
into  one  scale,  and  the  landlord  into  the  other,  and  let  us  see 
which  should  preponderate"? 

"  I  will  take  an  excellent  landlord  and  an  excellent  priest. 
The  landlord  shall  be  Sir  Edward  O'Brien,  and  the  priest 
shall  be  Mr.  Murphy  of  Oorofin.  Who  is  Sir  Edward  O'Brien  ? 
A  gentleman  who  has  a  great  fortune,  who  lives  in  a  splendid 
mansion,  and  who,  from  the  windows  of  a  palace,  looks  upon 
possessions  almost  as  wide  as  those  which  his  ancestors  beheld 
from  the  summit  of  their  feudal  towers.  His  tenants  pay  him 
their  rent  twice  a-year,  and  they  have  their  land  at  a  moder- 
ate rate.  So  much  for  the  landlord.  I  now  come  to  Father 
Murphy  of  Corofin.  Where  does  he  reside"?  In  an  humble 
abode,  situated  at  the  foot  of  a  mountain,  and  in  the  midst  of 
dreariness  and  waste.     He  dwells  in   the  midst  of  his  parish- 


3 12  CLAftE   ELECTION. 

ioners,  and  is  their  benefactor,  their  friend,  their  father.  It  ia 
not  only  in  the  actual  ministry  of  the  sacraments  of  religion 
that  he  stands  as  an  object  of  affectionate  reverence  among 
them.  I  saw  him,  indeed,  at  his  altar,  surrounded  by  thou- 
sands, and  felt  myself  the  influence  of  his  contagious  ard  en- 
thusiastic devotion.  He  addressed  the  people  in  the  midst 
of  a  rude  edifice,  and  in  a  language  which  I  did  not  understand  ; 
but  I  could  perceive  what  a  command  he  has  over  the  minds 
of  his  devoted  followers.  But  it  is  not  merely  as  the  celebra- 
tor  of  the  rites  of  Divine  worship  that  he  is  dear  to  his  flock ; 
he  is  their  companion,  the  mitigator  of  their  calamities,  the 
soother  of  their  afflictions,  the  trustee  of  their  hearts,  the  re- 
pository of  their  secrets,  the  guardian  of  their  interests,  and 
the  sentinel  of  their  death-beds.  A  peasant  is  dying:  in  the 
midst  of  the  winter's  night,  a  knock  is  heard  at  the  door  of  the 
priest,  and  he  is  told  that  his  parishioner  requires  his  spiritual 
assistance  :  the  wind  is  howling,  the  snow  descends  upon  the 
hills,  and  the  rain  and  storm  beat  against  his  face;  yet  he 
goes  forth,  hurries  to  the  hovel  of  the  expiring  wretch,  and, 
taking  his  station  beside  the  mass  of  pestilence  of  which  the 
bed  of  straw  is  composed,  bends  to  receive  the  last  whisper 
which  unloads  the  heart  of  its  guilt,  though  the  lips  of  the  sin- 
ner should  be  tainted  with  disease,  and  he  should  exhale  mor- 
tality in  his  breath. 

"  Gentlemen,  this  is  not  the  language  of  artificial  declama- 
tion—  this  is  not  the  mere  extravagance  of  rhetorical  phrase. 
This,  every  word  of  this,  is  the  truth  —  the  notorious,  palpable, 
and  unquestionable  truth.  You  know  it,  every  one  of  you 
know  it  to  be  true;  and  now  let  me  ask  you  can  you  wonder 
for  a  moment  that  the  people  should  be  attached  to  their  clergy, 
and  should  follow  their  ordinances  as  if  they  were  the  injunc- 
tions of  God  ]  Gentlemen,  forgive  me,  if  I  venture  to  suppli- 
cate, on  behalf  of  your  poor  tenants,  for  mercy  to  them.  Par- 
don them,  in  the  name  of  that  God  who  will  forgive  you  your 
offences  in  the  same  measure  of  compassion  which  you  will 
show  to  the  trespasses  of  others.  Do  not,  in  the  name  of  that 
Heaven  before  whom  every  one  of  us,  whether  landlord,  priest, 
or  tenant,  must  at  last  appear  —  do  not  prosecute  these  poor 


MR     SHEILAS   SPEECH.  513 

people  :  don't  throw  their  children  out  upon  the  public  road  — 
don't  send  them  forth  to  starve,  to  shiver,  and  to  die ! 

"  For  God's  sake,  Mr.  Fitzgerald  and  for  your  own  sake, 
and  as  you  are  a  gentleman  and  a  man  of  honor,  interpose 
your  influence  with  your  friends,  and  redeem  your  pledge.  1 
address  myself  personally  to  you.  On  the  first  day  of  the  elec- 
tion you  declared  that  you  would  deprecate  all  persecution  by 
the  landlords,  and  that  you  were  the  last  to  wish  that  harsh 
and  vindictive  measures  should  be  employed.  I  believe  you; 
and  now  I  call  upon  you  to  redeem  that  pledge  of  mercy,  to 
fulfil  that  noble  engagement,  to  perform  that  great  moral  prom- 
ise. You  will  cover  yourself  with  honor  by  so  doing,  in  the 
same  way  that  you  will  share  in  the  ignominy  that  will  attend 
upon  any  expedients  of  rigor.  Before  you  leave  this  country 
to  assume  your  high  functions,  employ  yourself  diligently  in 
this  work  of  benevolence,  and  enjoin  your  friends,  with  that 
eloquence  of  which  you  are  the  master,  to  refrain  from  cruelty, 
and  not  to  oppress  their  tenants.  Tell  them,  sir,  that  instead 
of  busying  themselves  in  the  worthless  occupation  of  revenge, 
it  is  much  fitter  that  they  should  take  the  political  condition 
of  their  country  into  their  deep  consideration.  Tell  them  that 
they  should  address  themselves  to  the  Legislature,  and  implore 
a  remedy  for  these  frightful  evils.  Tell  them  to  call  upon  the 
men,  in  whose  hands  the  destiny  of  this  great  empire  is  placed, 
to  adopt  a  system  of  conciliation  and  of  peace,  and  to  apply 
to  Ireland  the  great  canon  of  political  morality  which  has 
been  so  powerfully  expressed  by  the  poet  —  'Paris  imponere 
?norem.'  Our  manners,  our  habits,  our  laws,  must  be  changed. 
The  evil  is  to  be  plucked  out  at  the  root.  The  cancer  must 
be  cut  out  of  the  breast  of  the  country.  Let  it  not  be  imagined 
that  any  measure  of  disfranchisement,  that  any  additional 
penalty,  will  afford  a  remedy.  Things  have  been  permitted  to 
advance  to  a  height  from  which  they  can  not  be  driven  back. 

"  Protestants,  awake  to  a  sense  of  your  condition.  Look 
round  you.  What  have  you  seen  during  this  election  %  Enough 
to  make  you  feel  that  this  is  not  mere  local  excitation,  but  that 
seven  millions  of  Irish  people  are  completely  arrayed  and  or- 
ganized.    That  which  you  behold  in  Clare,  you  would  behold, 

Vol.  II.— 14 


314  CLARE   ELECTION. 

under  similar  circumstances,  in  every  county  in  the  kingdotn. 
Did  you  mark  our  discipline,  our  subordination,  our  good  order, 
and  that  prophetic  tranquillity  which  is  far  more  terrible  than 
any  ordinary  storm  1  You  have  seen  sixty  thousand  men  un- 
der our  command,  and  not  a  hand  was  raised,  and  not  a  forbid- 
den word  was  uttered,  in  that  amazing  multitude.  You  have 
beheld  an  example  of  our  power  in  the  almost  miraculous  so- 
briety of  the  people.  Their  lips  have  not  touched  that  infu- 
riating beverage  to  which  they  are  so  much  attached,  and  their 
habitual  propensity  vanished  at  our  command.  What  think 
you  of  all  this  1  Is  it  meet  and  wise  to  leave  us  armed  with 
such  a  dominion?  Trust  us  not  with  it;  strip  us  of  this  appal- 
ling despotism ;  annihilate  us  by  concession ;  extinguish  us 
with  peace;  disarray  us  by  equality;  instead  of  angry  slaves, 
make  us  contented  citizens :  if  you  do  not,  tremble  for  the 
result !" 


THE  PENENDEN  HEATH  MEETING. 

Anxious  to  witness  the  great  assembly  of  "  the  men  of  Kent," 
of  which  the  High-Sheriff  had  called  a  meetiug  (having  ap- 
pointed twelve  o'clock  upon  Friday  the  24th  for  the  immense 
gathering),  I  proceeded  from  Rochester  to  Maidstone  at  an 
early  hour.*     Upon  my  way,  I  saw  the  evidences  of  prodigious 

*  The  Repeal  of  the  Test  and  Corporation  Acts,  early  in  1828,  with  little 
more  than  a  shadow  of  resistance  from  the  Wellington  Ministry,  was  a  sort  of 
political  "  writing  on  the  wall,"  to  the  Protestant  Ascendency  people  throughout 
the  United  Kingdom.  To  check  any  further  concessions,  particularly  as  the 
Catholics  had  more  and  juster  claims  than  the  Dissenters,  it  was  resolved  to 
establish  Brunswick  Clubs,  which  were  practically  much  the  same,  minus  the 
secret  oaths  and  obligations,  as  the  Orange  Lodges,  put  down  by  a  prohibitory 
and  penal  statute  in  1825.  The  Duke  of  Cumberland  (brother  of  the  reigning 
sovereign)  was  the  patron  of  these  associations,  and  Lords  Winchilsea,  Ken- 
yon,  and  other  persons  of  rank  and  property,  were  openly  members.  Clare 
Election,  ending  July  5,  1828,  on  the  victory  of  O'Connell,  a  Catholic,  excited 
the  anger  and  apprehension  of  these  ultra-Protestant  agitators,  who  determined 
to  hold  public  meetings,  in  defence  of  Protestant  Ascendency  in  all  the  English 
counties.  The  first  of  these  came  off  in  Kent,  on  the  24th  of  October,  1828, 
on  Penenden  Heath,  and  from  twenty  thousand  to  thirty  thousand  persons  were 
present.  Mr.  Sheil,  whose  graphic  description  brings  the  scene  before  us,  hap- 
pened in  London  when  the  meeting  was  about  taking  place,  and  several  friends 
of  civil  and  religious  liberty  strongly  pressed  him  to  attend,  as  a  speaker,  con- 
fident that  he  might  thereby  advance  the  cause  which  they  had  at  heart.  He 
consented,  prepared  a  long  and  elaborate  speech,  obtained  the  small  landed 
qualification  requisite  to  allow  him  to  address  the  meeting  as  a  freeholder,  and 
proceeded  to  Penenden  Heath,  where  the  clamor  was  so  great  that  he  could 
utter  only  a  few  sentences,  though  what  he  intended  to  say  was  printed,  and 
distributed  far  and  wide.  The  Penenden  Heath  Meeting,  however,  did  not 
encourage  similar  attempts  elsewhere,  and  Protestant  Ascendency  made  no  fur- 
ther public  display  until  February,  1829,  when  Catholic  Emancipation  was  pro- 
posed as  a  Government  measure. —  The  newspapers  of  the  day  amused  then^ 


316  PENENDEN   HEATH   MEETING. 

exertion  to  call  the  yeomanry  together,  and  from  the  summit 
of  a  hill  that  surmounts  a  beautiful  valley  near  Maidstone,  I 
beheld  a  long  array  of  wagons  moving  slowly  toward  the  spot 
which  had  been  fixed  by  the  High-Sheriff"  for  the  meeting. 
The  morning  was  peculiarly  fine  and  bright,  and  had  a  rem- 
nant of  "  summer's  lingering  bloom  ;"  and  the  eye,  through  the 
pure  air,  and  from  the  elevated  spot  on  which  I  paused  to  sur- 
vey the  landscape,  traversed  an  immense  and  glorious  pros- 
pect. The  fertile  county  of  Kent,  covered  with  all  the  profu- 
sion of  English  luxury,  and  exhibiting  a  noble  spectacle  of 
agricultural  opulence,  was  before  me;  under  any  circumstances 
the  scene  would  have  attracted  my  attention,  but,  upon  the 
occasion  on  which  I  now  beheld  it,  it  was  accompanied  by  cir- 
cumstances which  greatly  added  to  its  influence,  and  lent  to 
the  beauty  of  nature  a  sort  of  moral  picturesque.  The  whole 
population  of  an  immense  district  seemed  to  have  swarmed 
from  their  towns  and  cottages,  and  filled  the  roads  and  ave- 
nues which  led  to  the  great  place  of  political  rendezvous.  In 
the  distance  lay  Penenden  Heath  ;  and  I  could  perceive  that, 
long  before  the  hour  appointed  by  the  Sheriff"  for  the  meeting, 
large  masses  had  assembled  upon  the  field,  where  the  struggle 
between  the  two  contending  parties  was  to  be  carried  on. 

After  looking  upon  this  extraordinary  spectacle,  I  proceeded 
on  my  journey.  I  passed  many  of  "  the  men  of  Kent,"  who 
were  going  on  foot  to  the  meeting;*  but  the  great  majority 
were  conveyed  in  those  ponderous  teams  which  are  used  for 
the  purposes  of  conveying  agricultural  produce  :  and,  indeed, 
"  the  men  of  Kent,"  who  were  packed  up  in  those  vehicles, 
seemed  almost  as  unconscious  as  the  ordinary  burdens  with 
which  their  heavy  vehicles  are  laden.  The  wagons  went  on 
in  their  dull  and  monotonous  rotation,  filled  with  human  beings, 

selves  with  ridiculing  Mr.  Sheil's  printed  but  unspoken  oration  ;  the  public, 
however,  perused  it  eagerly,  and  multitudes  of  copies  were  circulated  all  over 
the  Kingdom.  This  is  included  in  the  volume  of  Sheil's  published  speeches, 
and  is  in  every  way  worthy  of  his  great  reputation  for  political  rhetor ;c. —  M. 

*  There  is  a  difference  between  Men  of  Kent  and  Kentish  men.  The  formei 
are  locally  accounted  superior  to  the  latter.  A  Kentish  man,  is  a  native  of 
Kent  county,  born  north  of  the  river  Medway ;  a  "  Man  of  Kent"  comes  from 
$](j  district  south  of  that  river,  which  includes  two  thirds  of  that  county. —  M 


THE    GATHEEING.  317 

whose  faces  presented  a  vacant  blank,  in  which  it  was  impos- 
sible to  trace  the  smallest  interest  or  emotion.  They  did  not 
exchange  a  word  with  each  other,  but  sat  in  their  wagons, 
with  a  half-sturdy  and  half  fatuitous  look  of  apathy,  listening 
to  the  sound  of  the  bells  which  were  attached  to  the  horses  by 
which  they  were  drawn,  and  as  careless  as  those  animals  of 
the  events  in  which  they  were  going  to  take  a  part.  It  was 
easy,  however,  to  perceive  to  which  faction  they  belonged; 
for  poles  were  placed  in  each  of  these  wagons,  with  placards 
attached  to  them,  on  which  directions  were  given  to  the  loads 
of  freeholders  to  vote  for  their  respective  proprietors.  I  ex- 
pected to  have  seen  injunctions  to  vote  for  Emancipation,  or 
for  the  Constitution,  or  against  Popery  and  Slavery.  These 
ordinances  would,  in  all  likelihood,  have  been  above  the  com- 
prehension of  "the  men  of  Kent;"  and,  accordingly,  the  more 
intelligible  words,  "Vote  for  Lord  Winchilsea,"  or  "Vote  for 
Lord  Darnley,"*  were  inscribed  upon  the  placards. 

I  proceeded  to  my  place  of  destination,  and  reached  Peneh- 
den  Heath.  It  is  a  gently-sloping  amphitheatrical  declivity, 
surrounded  with  gradually-ascending  elevations  of  highly-cul- 
tivated ground,  and  presenting  in  the  centre  a  wide  space, 
exceedingly  well  calculated  for  the  holding  of  a  great  popular 
assembly.  On  arriving,  I  found  a  great  multitude  assembled 
at  about  an  hour  before  the  meeting.  A  large  circle  was 
formed,  with  a  number  of  wagons  placed  in  close  junction  to 
each  other,  and  forming  an  area  capable  of  containing  several 
thousand  persons.  There  was  an  opening  in  the  spot  immedi- 
ately opposite  the  Sheriff  for  the  reception  of  the  people,  who 
were  pouring  into  the  enclosure,  and  had  already  formed  a 
dense  mass.  The  wagons  were  laden  with  the  better  class  of 
yeomen,  with  the  gentry  at  their  head.     A  sort  of  hustings  was 

*  John  Stuart  Bligh,  fourth  Earl  of  Damley,  was  born  in  1767,  and  died  in 
1831.  In  1829,  he  claimed  the  Scottish  Dukedom  of  Lennox,  as  next  heir,  in 
default  of  male  issue  for  the  last  of  the  Stuarts.  Cardinal  York,  who  died  in 
1807  and  was  the  next-of-kin  (legitimate)  of  King  Charles  II.,  had  been 
duly  served  heir  to  the  peerage.  The  House  of  Lords  have  not  come  to  a  de 
cision  on  this  claim.  The  Damley  property  in  Kent,  is  Chobham  Hall,  near 
Gravesend.  The  Earldom  is  Irish,  but  its  holder  sits  in  the  Lords,  for  lu$ 
English  barony  of  Clifton, — Mt 


318  PENENDEN   HEATH   MEETING. 

raised  for  the  Sheriff  and  his  friends,  with  chairs  in  the  front, 
and  from  this  point  the  wagons  branched  off  in  two  wings  — 
that  on  the  left  of  the  Sheriff  being  allotted  to  the  Protestant, 
and  the  right  having  been  appropriated  to  the  Catholic  party. 
The  wagons  bore  the  names  of  the  several  persons  to  whom 
they  belonged,  and  were  designated  as  "  Lord  Winchilsea's," 
or  "  Lord  Darnley's,"  or  as  "  The  Committee's,"  and  ensigns 
were  displayed  from  them  which  indicated  the  opinions  of  their 
respective  occupiers. 

The  moment  I  ascended  one  of  the  wagons,  where  all  per- 
sons were  indiscriminately  admitted,  I  saw  that  the  Protest- 
ants, as  they  called  themselves,  had  had  the  advantage  in 
preparation,  and  that  they  were  well  arrayed  and  disciplined. 
Of  this  the  effects  produced  by  Lord  Winchilsea's  arrival 
afforded  strong  proof;  for  the  moment  he  entered,  there  was  a 
simultaneous  waving  of  hats  by  his  party,  and  the  cheering 
was  so  well  ordered  and  regulated,  that  it  was  manifest  that 
every  movement  of  the  faction  was  preconcerted  and  arranged. 
The  appearance  of  Lord  Darnley,  of  Lord  Radnor,*  and  the 
other  leaders  of  the  Catholic  party,  was  not  hailed  with  the 
same  concurrence  of  applause  from  their  supporters ;  not  that 
the  latter  were  not  warmly  zealous,  but  that  they  had  not  been 
disciplined  with  the  same  care. 

I  anxiously  watched  for  the  coming  of  Cobbett  and  of  Hunt 
I  not  only  desired  to  see  two  persons  of  whom  I  had  heard  so 
much,  but  to  ascertain  the  extent  of  their  influence  upon  the 
public  mind.  Cobbett,  I  understood,  had,  before  the  meeting 
took  place,  succeeded  in  throwing  discord  into  the  ranks  of  the 
liberal  party.  He  had  intimated  that  he  would  move  a  peti- 
tion against  tithes.  To  this  Lord  Darnley  vehemently  ob- 
jected, and  asked  very  reasonably  how  he  could,  as  a  peer  of 

*  William  Pleydell  Bouverie,  third  Earl  of  Radnor,  was  born  in  1779,  and 
sat  in  the  House  of  Commons,  from  an  early  age  until  1828.  He  was  known, 
as  a  Commoner,  by  his  courtesy  title  of  Viscount  Folkstone,  during  his  father's 
life.  He  took  a  leading  part,  in  1809,  in  the  investigation  of  the  charges 
against  the  late  Duke  of  York,  of  having  allowed  Mary  Anne  Clarke,  his  mistress, 
to  dispose  of  commissions  in  the  army,  by  her  influence.  Whither  in  the  Upper 
or  Lower  House,  the  speeches  and  votes  of  Lord  Radnor  have  generally  been 
in  aid  of  the  ]iberal  cause. —  M. 


WILLIAM   COBBETT.  319 

the  realm,  co-operate  in  such  a  proposal.  Several  others,  how 
ever,  although  they  greatly  disapproved  of  Cobbett's  proposi- 
tion in  the  abstract,  were  disposed  to  support  any  expedient 
which  would  have  the  effect  of  extinguishing  the  Brunswick 
faction.  It  had  therefore  been  decided  first,  to  try  whether 
the  Brunswick  measure  could  not  be  got  rid  of  without  having 
recourse  to  any  substitute,  and,  in  the  event  of  failing  in  that 
course,  to  sustain  Cobbett's  amendment.  Oobbett  had  dined 
the  preceding  day  at  Maidstone,  with  about  a  hundred  farmers, 
and  had  been  very  well  received.  He  there  gave  intimations 
of  his  intended  proposition  against  the  Church.  His  friends 
said  that  he  had  devoted  great  care  to  his  petition,  and  that  he 
plumed  himself  upon  it.  I  thought  it  exceedingly  probable 
that  he  would  succeed  in  carrying  his  measure,  especially  as 
he  had  obtained  a  signal  triumph  at  a  meeting  connected  with 
the  Corn-Laws,  and  borne  down  the  gentry  before  him.  These 
anticipations  had  greatly  raised  my  curiosity  about  this  singu- 
lar person,  and  I  watched  the  effect  which  his  coming  should 
produce  with  some  solicitude. 

He  at  length  arrived.  Upon  his  entering  the  enclosure,  I 
heard  a  cry  of  "Oobbett,  Cobbett!"  and  turning  my  eyes  to 
the  spot  from  which  the  exclamation  came,  I  perceived  less 
sensation  than  I  had  expected  to  find.*     Some  twenty  of  the 

1  William  Cobbett,  son  of  a  small  farmer  in  Sussex,  was  born  in  1762,  and 
enlisted  as  a  private  soldier,  when  he  was  about  two-and -twenty  years  old.  He 
was  sent  with  his  regiment  to  British  North  America;  diligently  educated  him- 
self as  an  English  scholar;  was  raised  by  his  good  conduct  to  the  rank  of  ser- 
geant-major; obtained  his  discharge  (with  good-service  certificate)  'liter  seven 
years'  service  ;  returned  to  England,  and  went  to  France  to  peifect  himself  in 
French  ;  thence  came  to  .the  United  States,  where,  writing  under  the  soubriquet 
of  "Peter  Porcupine,"  he  got  into  hot  water;  he  again  returned  home,  and 
supported  the  Government  in  a  daily  paper  called  the  Porcupine  '  changed  that 
publication  into  Cobbett's  Weekly  Register,  in  which  he  assailed  the  Ministry, 
with  much  continuity  and  force  ;  was  prosecuted,  and  fined  repeatedly,  but 
most  heavily  for  comments  on  the  illegal  flogging  of  some  militia-men  at  Ely, 
for  which  he  had  to  undergo  two  years'  imprisonment,  with  a  fine  of  one  thou- 
sand pounds  sterling  ;  continued  his  Register,  however,  during  his  confinement, 
and  until  what  were  called  the  "  S;  c  Acts"  were  passed  to  check  him ;  came 
back  to  America,  whence  his  Register,  still  published  in  London,  was  duly 
supplied  with  "  copy,"  until  his  final  return  to  England  in  1819,  bringing  with 


320  PENENDEN    HEATH   MEETING. 

lowest  class  of  freeholders  made  some  demonstration  of  pleas* 
are  at  his  appearance,  and  followed  him  as  he  made  his  way 
toward  a  wagon  on  the  right  of  the  Sheriff.  He  was  dressed 
in  a  gray  frieze  coat,  with  a  red  handkerchief,  which  gave  him 
a  very  extraordinary  aspect,  and  presented  him  in  contrast 
with  the  body  of  those  who  occupied  the  wagons,  who,  on  ac- 
count of  the  public  mourning,  were  dressed  in  black.  He 
seemed  in  excellent  health  and  spirits,  for  his  cheeks  were 
almost  as  ruddy  as  his  neckcloth,  and  set  off  his  white  hair, 
while  his  eyes  sparkled  at  the  anticipation  of  the  victory  which 
he  was  confident  that  he  should  obtain.     He  seemed  to  me  to 

him  the  bones  of  Thomas  Paine  ;  successfully  contested  the  representation  of 
Coventry,  in  1820,  and  of  Preston,  in  1826  ;  warmly  supported  the  French 
Revolution  of  July,  1830;  was  tried,  in  July,  1831,  for  the  publication  of  "a 
libel,  with  intent  to  raise  discontent  in  the  minds  of  the  laborers  in  husbandry, 
and  to  excite  them  to  acts  of  violence,  and  to  destroy  cornstacks,  machinery, 
and  other  property;"  defended  himself  so  ably  and  boldly,  that  the  jury  declined 
agreeing  on  a  verdict  of  conviction  ;  and  thus  allowed  him  a  victory  over  Lord 
Grey's  Ministry,  who  had  prosecuted  him.  From  that  hour,  his  attacks  on  the 
Grey  Ministry  were  untiring.  He  travelled  all  over  the  country,  lecturing 
against  them,  and  always  with  success.  He  continued  his  weekly  attacks  on 
them,  in  his  Register,  and  his  exposure  of  ministerial  nepotism  and  grasping 
selfishness,  as  evidenced  by  "  The  Grey  List,"  or  schedule  of  places  and  sinecures 
distributed  among  members  and  connections  of  the  family  of  Earl  Grey,  had 
a  mighty  influence  in  throwing  that  nobleman  into  the  cold  shade  of  unpopu- 
larity, after  the  Reform  Bill  excitement  had  subsided.  In  December,  1832, 
Cobbett  was  elected  M.  P.  for  Oldham,  in  Lancashire,  under  the  Reform  Bill. 
He  was  constant  in  his  attendance,  and  a  good  man  of  business,  but  did  not 
succeed  in  Parliament  —  a  motion  of  his  for  the  impeachment  of  Sir  Robert 
Peel  was  a  signal  failure.  The  late  hours  and  unwholesome  atmosphere  of  the 
Houso  told  against  one  who  used  to  boast  of  rising  at  four  and  going  to  bed  at 
nine.  In  May,  1835,  he  was  suddenly  attacked  with  a  disease  of  the  throat, 
which  eventuated  in  his  death,  on  June  17,  1835,  aged  seventy-three.  In  July, 
1852,  his  second  son,  John  Morgan  Cobbett,  was  elected  member  for  Oldham, 
which  he  had  unsuccessfully  contested  in  July,  1835,  on  his  father's  death,  as  wel] 
as  in  July,  1847. —  William  Cobbett  was  an  inconsistent  politician,  veiy  much 
swayed  by  impulse  and  personal  feeling,  but,  self-taught  as  he  was,  no  English 
writer  of  his  time  was  master  of  a  purer  style  of  writing.  Southey,  the  poet, 
told  me,  in  1836,  that  since  the  time  of  Jeremy  Taylor,  no  man  had  written 
6uch  pure,  homely,  and  expressive  English  as  William  Cobbett.  He  had  a 
great  love  of  the  country,  and  some  of  his  descriptions  are  landscapes  in  words. 
A  curious  vein  of  egotism  ran  through  all  nis  writings,  and,  strangely  enough, 
fanned  one  of  their  leading  attractions. —  M. 


WILLIAM    COBBETT*  321 

mistake  the  following-  and  acclamation  of  a  few  of  the  rabble  for 
the  applauses  of  the  whole  meeting.  When,  however,  he  as- 
cended the  wagon,  and  stood  before  the  assembly,  he  ought  to 
have  discovered  that  he  did  not  stand  very  high  in  the  general 
favor;  for  while  the  circle  about  him  cheered  him  with  rather 
faint  plaudits,  the  moment  his  tall  but  somewhat  fantastical 
figure  was  exhibited  to  the  meeting,  he  was  assailed  by  the 
Brunswickers  with  the  grossest  insults,  which,  instead  of  exci- 
ting the  anger,  produced  a  burst  of  merriment  among  the  Cath- 
olic party.  "Down  with  the  old  bone  grubber !"  —  "Oh,  Cob- 
bett,  have  you  brought  Burdett  along  with  you?"  —  "Where's 
your  gridiron  %"  —  "  Will  you  pay  Burdett  out  of  the  next  crop 
of  Indian  corn  ?"  These,  and  other  contumelies,  were  lavished 
upon  him  by  a  set  of  fellow s  who  were  obviously  posted  in  the 
meeting,  in  order  to  assail  their  antagonists  and  beat  them 
down.  Cobbett  was  so  flushed  with  the  certainty  of  success, 
and  so  self-deluded  by  his  egregious  notions  of  his  own  impor- 
tance, that  his  temper  was  not  at  first  disturbed,  but.  looking 
down  triumphantly  to  those  immediately  about  him,  and  draw- 
ing forth  a  long  petition,  told  them  that  he  had  brought  them 
something  that  should  content  them  all.  I  surveyed  him  at- 
tentively at  this  moment. 

Uobbett  is  generally  represented  as  a  man  of  rather  a  clown- 
ish-looking demeanor;  and  I  have  read,  in  some  descriptions 
of  him,  that  he  could  not,  at  first  vieAv,  suggest  any  notion  of 
his  peculiar  intellectual  powers.  I  do  not  at  all  agree  in  the 
opinion.  He  has  certainly  a  rude  and  rough  bearing,  and 
afiects  a  heedlessness  of  form,  amounting  to  coarseness  and 
rusticity.  But  it  is  only  requisite  to  look  at  him,  in  order  to 
see  in  the  expression  of  his  countenance  the  vigorous  mind 
with  which  he  is  endowed.  The  higher  portion  of  his  face  is 
not  unlike  Sir  Walter  Scott's,  to  whom  he  bears,  especially 
about  the  brow,  a  resemblance.*     His  eyes   are  more  vivid 

*  There  were  several  points  of  personal  resemblance  between  Scott  and  Cob- 
bett—  so  much  so  that  when  I  first  saw  Cobbett,  in  1830,  I  mistook  him  for  Sii 
Walter,  whose  acquaintance  I  had  made,  some  time  before,  on  his  visit  to  Ire- 
land. Scott  was  taller  and  more  erect ;  Cobbett  looked  like  a  plain,  well-to-d** 
farmer.     The  expression  of  Scott's  face  indicated  shrewdness  and  sagacity ;  that 

3.4* 


822  PENENDKN    HEATH    MEETING. 

than  the  great  author's,  while  the  lower  part  of  his  countenance 
is  expressive  of  fierce  and  vehement  emotions.  His  attire  and 
aspect  certainly  suggest,  at  first  view,  his  early  occupations, 
and  the  predilections  of  his  later  life  (for  he  is  more  attached 
to  agriculture  than  to  politics) ;  but  whoever  looks  at  him  nar- 
rowly will  see  the  impress  of  intellectual  superiority  upon  his 
countenance,  and  perceive,  under  his  rude  bearing,  the  pre- 
dominance of  mind.  When  he  first  addressed  the  people,  he 
was  in  exceedingly  good  humor;  and  as  he  snapped  his  fingers, 
and  cried  out,  "  Emancipation  is  all  roguery  !"  the  laugh  which 
the  recollection  of  his  own  devotedness  to  the  Catholic  cause 
created,  was  echoed  by  his  own  merriment,  and  he  seemed  to 
enjoy  his  political  inconsistency  as  an  exceeding  good  joke. 
He  told  the  people  that  he  was  Avell  aware  that  the  Sheriff  in- 
tended to  adjourn  the  meeting,  but  that  he  would  stay  there, 
and  hold  a  meeting  himself. 

Next  to  Cobbett  stood  the  great  leader  of  the  radicals,  Mr. 
Hunt.*     A  reconciliation  has  been  recently  effected  between 

of  Cobbett's  denoted  moi*e  of  cunning  —  the  look  of  a  man  determined  not  to 
be  taken  in.  Both  wore  very  plain  attire,  and  I  never  saw  gloves  with  either. 
Cobbett  dressed  like  a  Surrey  farmer:   Scott  like  a  Border  laird. —  M. 

*  Henry  Hunt,  for  a  long  time  the  leader  of  the  Radical  Reform  movement 
in  England  (hence  the  title  of  "  Radicals"),  was  originally  a  farmer  in  Wilt- 
shire. In  his  youth,  he  was  such  a  strong  loyalist,  that,  in  1801,  when  Napoleon 
threatened  to  invade  England,  which  threat  did  "fright  the  isle  out  of  its  pro- 
priety," he  offered  the  whole  of  his  stock,  valued  at  twenty  thousand  pounds 
sterling,  for  the  use  of  the  Government,  if  needed,  and  engaged  to  enter,  with 
three  of  his  servants  all  well  mounted  and  equipped  at  his  own  cost,  as  volun- 
teers into  any  regiment  of  horse  that  might  make  the  first  charge  upon  the 
enemy.  He  joined  the  Marlborough  troop  of  cavalry  yeomanry,  but  a  dispute 
with  Lord  Bruce,  its  commander,  caused  him  to  challenge  that  officer,  for 
which  he  was  tried,  fined  one  hundred  pounds,  and  imprisoned  for  six  weeks. 
From  this  time  he  joined  the  party  who  demanded  radical  reform  of  all  abuses 
in  Church  and  State.  In  August  16,  1819,  he  presided  at  a  reform  meeting 
in  St.  Peter's  fields,  Manchester,  where  the  Magistrates  interrupted  the  pro- 
ceedings by  sending  mounted  yeomanry  among  the  unarmed  multitude,  shooting 
and  sabring  them  in  a  brutal  manner.  This  has  long  been  called  "  The  Mas- 
Baere  of  Reterloo."  The  murdering  magistrates  escaped  with  impunity,  but 
Hunt  was  indicted  as  the  ringleader  of  an  unlawful  assembly  of  the  people,  tried, 
convicted,  and  sentenced  to  three  years'  imprisonment  in  Ilchester  jail.  Ho 
j'jhiequently  attempted  to  drive  a  trade  by  selling  ground  roasted  corn,  as  a 


HENEY   HUNT.  323 

them,  and  they  stood  together  in  the  front  of  the  same  wagon 
before  the  people.  I  was  surprised  to  find  in  Mr.  Hunt,  a  man 
of  an  exceedingly  mild  and  gentle  aspect,  with  a  smooth  and 
almost  youthful  cheek,  a  bright  and  pleasant  eye,  a  sweet  and 
urbane  smile,  and  altogether  a  most  gentlemanlike  and  dis- 
arming demeanor.  His  voice  too  is  exceedingly  melodious, 
and  as  soft  as  his  manners.  This  Gracchus  of  Manchester  is 
utterly  unlike  the  picture  which  the  imagination  is  apt  to  form 
of  a  tribune  of  the  people  ;  and,  indeed,  I  do  not  consider  him 
to  possess  the  external  qualifications  of  a  great  demagogue, 
though  he  is  certainly  endowed  with  that  plain  and  simple 
eloquence  which  is  so  peculiarly  effective  with  an  English 
multitude.  Near  Hunt  and  Oobbett,  the  Pylades  and  Orestes 
of  radicalism,  stood  Counsellor  French,*  an  Irish  Catholic 
barrister,  who  is  now  a  prosetyte  among  the  reformers,  but 
seems  to  have  many  of  the  qualities  necessary  to  constitute  an 
apostle  in  the  cause,  and  is  likely  one  day  to  set  up  for  himself. 
In  the  wagon  next  that  in  which  Cobbett,  Darrel,  and  Hunt, 

substitute  for  coffee,  but  the  Excise  interfered.  Finally,  he  settled  down  into 
a  large  manufacturer  of  "  Hunt's  Matchless  Blacking."  He  made  several  at- 
tempts to  obtain  a  seat  in  Parliament,  but  was  unsuccessful  at  Bristol,  Westmin 
ster,  and  Somersetshire.  At  last,  in  the  borough  of  Preston,  in  Lancashire,  the 
potwallopers  (every  man  who  boiled  a  pot  within  its  limits)  elected  him  in 
1830  and  again  in  1831  —  the  first  time  rejecting  their  previous  member,  Mr. 
Stanley  (Earl  of  Derby,  in  1854)  whose  family  had  long  all  but  nominated  the 
members.  Mr.  Hunt,  a  popular  open  air  speaker,  by  no  means  made  his  mark 
in  the  legislature,  but  was  quiet,  and  subdued,  though  consistent  in  the  liberality 
of  his  votes.  He  was  nearly  sixty  years  old  when  he  entered  Parliament,  anr] 
was  too  old  to  accommodate  himself  to  its  routine  and  requirements.  In  the 
election  of  1832,  following  the  enactment  of  the  Reform  Bill,  the  electors  of 
"  proud  Preston,"  as  the  smoky  place  is  called,  did  not  re-elect  Mr.  Hunt 
He  died  in  February,  1835,  aged  sixty-two.  In  person  he  was  tall  and  mus 
cular.  His  oratory  was  singularly  devoid  of  ornament,  but  he  had  a  plain  waj 
of  putting  facts,  argument,  and  assertions,  before  his  auditory,  which  had  im- 
mense force.  He  published  his  own  Memoirs,  while  in  prison,  but  their  liter- 
ary merit  was  small.  At  one  time,  he  was  the  most  popular  man  in  England', 
and  his  summons  would  have  collected  a  hundred  thousand  men,  in  the  subuir-s 
of  London  alone. —  M. 

*  Counsellor  French,  who  was  a  strong  Catholic,  held  a  public  discussion  ae 
Hammersmith,  London,  on  points  of  religious  faith  and  practice,  with  a  Minis 
ter  of  the  Scotch  Church,  named  Gumming.     This  was  many  years  after  Email 
cipation  was  granted.     Both  claimed  the  victory  —  of  course. —  M, 


324  PENENDKN   HEATtt   M&ETlHfl. 

were  placed,  sat  Mr.  Slieil,  tLe  Irish  demagogue.  This  gentle- 
man was  said,  by  some  people,  to  have  been  sent  over  by  the 
Association  ;  while  others  asserted,  that  he  had  of  his  own 
accord  embarked  in  the  perilous  enterprise  of  addressing  "the 
Men  of  Kent."  There  was  a  feeling  of  curiosity,  mingled  with 
disrelish,  produced  by  his  appearance  there.  The  English 
Catholics  had  endeavored  to  dissuade  him  from  the  under- 
taking; and  Mr.  Darrel,  a  gentleman  of  property  in  the 
county,  was  particularly  anxious  that  he  should  not  attempt, 
to  speak.  Lord  Darnley  was  also  very  adverse  to  this  adven- 
turous step,  and  so  far  from  having  given  Mr.  Sheil  a  freehold, 
had  intimated,  I  heard,  that  the  death  bed  of  the  Duke  of 
York  was  not  yet  so  much  forgotten,  that  Mr.  Sheil  should 
venture  into  such  an  assembly.*  That  gentleman  sat  in  one 
of  the  wagons,  apparently  careless  of  the  impression  which  he 
should  produce ;  but  his  pale  and  bilious  face,  in  "which  dis- 
content and  solicitude,  mingled  with  a  spirit  of  sardonic  viru- 
lence, are  expressed,  and  his  restless  and  unquiet  eye,  gave 
indications  that  he  was  annoyed  at  the  opprobrious  epithets 
which  were  showered  upon  him,  and  that  he  was  anxious  about 
the  event,  as  it  should  personally  affect  himself.  There  is 
certainly  in  Mr.  Shell's  face  and  person  little  to  bespeak  the 
favor  of  a  public  assembly;  and  if  he  produces  oratorical 
effects,  he  must  be  indebted  to  a  power  of  phrase,  and  an  art 
in  delivery,  of  which,  in  the  uproar  in  which  he  spoke,  it  was 
impossible  in  that  meeting  to  form  any  estimate.  Next  to  Mr. 
Sheil  was  the  wagon  appropriated  to  the  Committee,  where 
there  were  some  English  Catholics  ;  and  Lord  Darnley's  and 
Lord  Radnor's  wagons  succeeded. 

The  opposite  wing-  was,  as  I  have  mentioned,  occupied  hy 

*  When  the  Duke  of  York  was  dying,  two  years  after  he  had  sworn,  "  So 
help  me  God,"  that  he  never  would  consent  to  any  measure  of  Catholic  Eman- 
cipation, Mr.  Sheil  endeavored  "to  point  a  moral"  from  the  approaching 
funeral  of  him  who  had  raised  his  hand  to  heaven  against  the  speakers  coun- 
try, and  concluded  hy  saying  that,  the  solemn  pageant  ended,  "  the  business, 
and  pursuits,  and  all  the  frivolities  of  life'  will  be  resumed ;  and  the  heir  to 
rhree  kingdoms  will  be  in  a  week  forgotten ;  we,  too,  shah  pardon  and  forgcl 
nim."  There  was  a  great  outcry  against  this  speech,  at  this  time,  and  tbo 
Brunswick  Clu'»9  fanned  the  angry  flame,  as  best  they  could. —  M 


fcA&L    OF    WINCHILSEA.  325 

the  Br uns wickers,  of  wLom  by  far  the  most  conspicuous  was 
Lord  Winchilsea.  He  is  a  tall,  strong-built,  vigorous-looking 
man,  destitute  of  all  dignity  or  grace,  but  with  a  bluff,  rude, 
and  direct  nautical  bearing,  which  reminds  one  of  the  quarter- 
deck, and  would  lead  you  to  suppose  that  he  was  the  mate  of  a 
ship  (a  conjecture  which  a  black  silk  handkerchief  tied  tightly 
about  his  neck,  tends  to  assist)  rather  than  an  hereditary  Coun- 
sellor of  the  Crown.  Whatever  feelings  of  partiality  his  late 
conduct  may  have  generated  toward  him  with  his  own  faction, 
he  is  certainly  not  popular  in  the  county;  for  he  is  the  terror 
of  poachers,  and  is  most  arbitrary  in  the  enforcement  of  the 
game  laws.  It  is  but  justice  to  him  to  say,  that  he  has,  upon 
one  or  two  occasions,  when  he  has  detected  poachers  upon  his 
estate,  given  them  the  alternative  of  going  to  prison  or  fighting 
with  him  ;  for  to  his  political  he  superadds  no  inconsiderable 
pugilistic  qualifications.  He  seems  very  well  qualified  to  lead 
an  English  mob,  and  possesses,  in  a  far  greater  perfection  than 
Hunt  or  Cobbett,  the  demagogic  qualities  of  voice,  which  gave 
him,  at  Penenden  Heath,  a  great  advantage  over  his  oppo- 
nents.* Before  the  chair  Avas  taken,  he  was  actively  engaged 
in  marshalling  his  troops,  and  cheering  them  on  to  battle,  and 
it  was  manifest  that  he  felt  all  the  excitement  of  a  leader 
engaged  in  a  cause,  upon  the  issue  of  which  his  own  political 
importance  was  depending.  I  did  not  remark  any  persons  of 
rank  about  him,  and,  indeed,  the  Protestant  was  conspicuously 
inferior  in  this  particular  to  the  Catholic  wing.  There  were, 
however,  on  the  left  side,  a  number  of  persons,  in  whom  it  was 
easy  to  recognise  the  sacerdotal  physiognomy,  of  far  more 
influence  than  noblemen  could  have  been  ;  the  whole  body  of 
the  Kent  Clergy  were  marshalled  for  the  occasion ;  and  not 
only  the  priests-  of  the  established  religion,  but  many  of  the 

*  George  Finch  Hatton,  tenth  Earl  of  Wincliilsca  and  Nottingham,  was  bom 
in  1791,  and  succeeded  to  the  title  in  1826.  His  place  in  Kent,  is  Eastwell 
Park.  He  has  always  been  much  opposed,  polemically  and  politically,  to  the. 
Catholics.  In  1829,  having  published  a  letter  in  which  he  imputed  to  the 
Duke  of  Wellington  a  desire  to  introduce  popery  into  every  department  of  the 
state,  the  Duke  called  on  him  to  retract  and  apologize,  and,  on  refusal  to  do  so, 
was  challenged  by  his  Grace,  and  a  duel  ensued,  in  which  neither  combatant  was 
ftit. — In  youth,  from  his  loud  voice,  the  Earl  was  called  "  Roaring  Hatton." — M. 


326  PENENDEN    HEA.TH   MEETTtftf. 

dissenting  preachers  of  the  Methodist  school,  were  arrayed 
under  the  Winchilsea  banners.  It  was  easy  to  recognise  them 
even  amid  the  crowd  of  men  habited  in  black,  by  their  lugu- 
brious and  dismal  expression.  The  clergy  at  the  meeting  were 
so  numerous,  that  the  Protestant  side  had  much  more  a  clerical 
than  an  agricultural  aspect. 

The  different  parties  being  thus  distributed,  and  every 
wagon  having  been  occupied,  and  the  whole  of  the  area  within 
the  enclosure  having  been  filled  by  the  dense  crowd,  the 
Sheriff,  Sir  T.  Mary  on  Wilson,*  appeared  exactly  at  twelve 
o'clock,  and  took  the  chair.  lie  seemed  to  me,  from  the  dis- 
tance at  which  I  saw  him,  a  young  man,  quite  untutored  in  the 
business  of  public  meetings ;  but  he  had  beside  him  his  sub- 
sheriff,  Mr.  Scudamore,  who  appeared  to  have  all  the  zeal  by 
which  his  employer  was  actuated  in  the  cause  of  Protestantism, 
and  to  be  perfectly  well-versed  in  the  stratagems  by  which  an 
advantage  may  be  given  to  one  party,  without  affording  to  the 
other  the  opportunity  of  complaining  of  any  very  gross  breach 
of  decorum.  This  gentleman  had  a  coarse,  red-whiskered, 
and  blunt  face,  of  the  Dogberry  character,  in  which  a  vulgar 
authoritativeness  was  combined  with  those  habits  of  submission 
to  his  superior,  which  are  generally  found  in  subordinate  func- 
tionaries. 

The  High-Sheriff  having  taken  his  station,  delivered  a  brief 
speech,  in  which  he  stated  the  object  of  the  meeting  to  be  the 
adoption  of  such  measures  as  should  be  deemed  most  advisable 
for  the  support  of  the  church  establishment ;  and  he  concluded 
by  enjoining  the  assembly  to  hear  all  parties,  a  precept  which 
he  certainly  exhibited  no  very  great  solicitude  to  embody  in 
his  own  conduct.  A  letter  from  the  brother  of  Mr.  Honey  wood 
was  then  read,  in  which  an  excuse  was  made  for  that  gentle- 
man upon  the  ground  of  indisposition  (it  was  well  known  that 

*  Sir  Thomas  Mary  on  Wilson,  who,  as  High  Sheriff  of  Kent,  was  "  first  man 
in  the  county"  in  1828,  was  born  in  1800  ;  owns  a  property  in  Kent,  called 
Charlton  House  ;  and  has  been  chiefly  noted,  of  late  years,  by  his  constant  ef- 
fort1* to  obtain  the  enactment  of  a  Parliamentary  statute  allowing  him  to  enclose, 
for  his  own  use  and  profit,  a  great  part  of  Hampstead  Heath,  near  Highgate, 
which  is  now  the  common  property  of  the  London  public,  and  is  used  by  them 
toi  purposes  of  healthful  recreation. —  M. 


1HE    DUCHESS    AND   THE   COALHEAVER.  327 

lie  was  adverse  to  the  objects  of  the  meeting),  ara.3  tlien  Mr, 
Gipps  rose  to  move  the  petition.  I  found  it  difficult  to  ascer- 
tain exactly  who  he  was;  but  thus  far  I  learned,  that  he  is 
not  a  man  of  influence  or  weight  from  property  in  the  county, 
and,  indeed,  I  could  see  no  motive  for  putting  him  in  the  fore- 
ground, excepting  that  he  has  a  clear  and  distinct  voice,  Avhich, 
in  a  less  clamorous  assembly,  would  have  been  probably  heard 
by  a  considerable  part  of  the  meeting.  He  dwelt  upon  a  vari- 
ety of  the  common  topics  which  are  pressed  into  the  service 
of  Anti-catholicism,  but  gave  no  novelty  by  any  unusual  dis- 
play of  diction  to  the  old  arguments  against  Popery.  He 
seemed  himself  to  chuckle  at  what  he  conceived  to  be  a  pecu- 
liarly jocular  and  picturesque  representation  of  Mr.  O'Connell, 
at  the  Clare  election,  bowing  down  to  receive  the  benediction 
of  a  Bishop,  forgetting  that  it  was  hardly  stranger  on  the  part 
of  Mr.  O'Connell  to  go  through,  what  is,  after  all,  I  believe,  a 
common  form  with  pious  Roman  Catholics,  than  for  a  Duchess 
to  print  her  beautiful  lips  on  the  black  and  bearded  mouth  of 
a  coal-heaver,  in  order  to  obtain  a  vote  for  Mr.  Fox.*  I  am 
surprised  that  this  parallel  was  not  adduced  in  Mr.  O'Connell's 
defence.  After  Mr.  Gipps  had  expended  himself  in  a  monoto- 
nous and  wearisome  diatribe  against  the  Catholic  religion,  he 
proceeded  to  read  a  petition,  which  the  liberal  party  had  antici- 
pated would  have  prayed  distinctly  against  all  concessions  to 
the  Roman  Catholics.  To  their  surprise,  it  was  couched  in  the 
following  words  : — 

*  Georgiana,  Duchess  of  Devonshire,  whose  [reputed?]  son  is  the  present 
Duke,  was  a  very  clever,  charming-,  and  (though  her  hair  was  of  the  color  be- 
tween golden  and  red)  beautiful  woman.  She  was  a  leader  of  the  fashionable 
world  of  London,  for  many  years.  She  was  married  at  the  early  age  of  seven- 
teen, and  her  house  became  a  sort  of  political  meeting-place  for  the  old  Whig 
leaders.  She  wrote  poetry  —  and  Coleridge  eulogized  the  "  heroic  measure" 
of  her  "  Passage  of  Mont  St.  Gothard."  She  composed  music  also,  and  pa- 
tronized painters  and  sculptors.  During  the  great  Westminster  Election,  in 
which  Fox,  "  the  Man  of  the  People,"  was  a  candidate,,  she  personally  can- 
vassed for  him.  The  story  alluded  to  by  Mr.  Shed  was  that  having  asked  a 
coal-heaver  to  vote  for  Fox,  he  said,  "Yes,  if  you  will  kiss  me,"  and  that,  put- 
ting a  guinea  between  her  lips,  she  allowed  him  to  take  kiss  and  coin  at  the 
same  time-,  on  which  he  voted  for  Fox! — The  Duchess,  albeit  Touch  talked 
about,  is  believed  to  have  been  a  virtuous  wife.  She  died  in  1806,  aged  forty 
.'line. —  M. 


328  FENENDEN    HEATH    MEETING. 

"Your  Petitioners  beg  leave  to  express  to  your  Honor- 
able House,  tbeir  sense  of  the  blessings  tbey  enjoy  under 
the  Protestant  Constitution  of  these  Kingdoms,  as  settled 
at  the  Revolution,  viewing  Avith  the  deepest  regret  the 
proceedings  which  have  for  a  long  time  been  carrying  on 
in  Ireland. 

"Your  Petitioners  feel  themselves  imperatively  called 
upon  to  declare  their  strong  and  inviolable  attachment  to 
those  Protestant  principles,  which  have  proved  to  be' the 
best  security  for  the  civil  and  religious  liberty  of  these 
Kingdoms. 

"  They  therefore  approach  your  Honorable  House,  hum- 
bly but  earnestly  praying  that  the  Protestant  Constitution 
of  the  United  Kingdom  may  be  preserved  entire  and  in- 
violable." 

The  phraseology  of  this  petition,  from  its  moderate  charac- 
ter, excited  some  surprise;  and  it  was  justly  said  that  no 
Protestant  could  object  to  the  matter  for  which  it  ostensibly 
purported  to  pray.  The  compatibility  of  concession  to  the 
Catholics  with  the  entirety  and  inviolability  of  the  Protestant 
Church,  has  been  always  maintained,  by  not  only  the  Prot- 
estant, but  Catholic  advocates  of  their  claims.  This  subdued 
tone  of  the  petition  gave  distinct  proof  that  the  Clubbists  cal- 
culated upon  a  strong  opposition  to  any  more  forcible  inter- 
ference with  the  legislature.  The  object,  however,  of  the 
Clubbists  was  obvious,  and  the  petition  was  resisted,  not  so 
much  upon  the  ground  of  its  containing  anything  in  itself  very 
objectionable,  as  that  the  intent  of  the  petitioners  themselves 
was  avowed. 

A  Mr.  Plumtre*  seconded  Mr.  Gipps.  It  was  said  that  he 
was  a  Calvinist,  and  he  certainly  had  the  aspect  which  we 
might  suppose  to  have  been  worn  by  the  founder  of  his  religion 

#  In  1828,  Mr.  Plumtre  was  one  of  the  parliamentary  representatives  of  Kent, 
and  ultra-illiberal  in  his  politics  and  religion.  He  pi operly  belonged  to  a  small 
but.  compact  body  in  the  House  of  Commons,  called  "  The  Saints."  He  was 
a  well-meaning,  foolish-acting,  absurd-speaking  man  —  a  sort  of  parliamentary 
Molvolio. —  M 


MARQUIS   CAMDEN.  329 

when  lie  ordered  Servetus  to  be  consumed  by  a  slow  fire.  He 
said  nothing  at  all  worth  note. 

When  Mr.  Plumtre  sat  down,  Lord  Camden  addressed  the 
Sheriff*  He  occupied  a  peculiar  station.  Instead,  as  was 
observed  in  one  of  the  morning  papers,  of  taking  his  place 
upon  the  right  side,  and  bringing  up  his  tenants  in  a  body,  he 
came  unattended,  and  selected  a  place  upon  the  hustings  near 
the  Sheriff.  He  deprecated  all  kinds  of  partisanship  in  the 
course  which  he  took  in  the  proceedings;  and  certainly  his 
deportment  and  look  indicated  that  it  was  with  no  other  feel- 
ing than  one  of  duty,  and  without  any  kind  of  struggle  for 
superiority,  that  he  had  mingled  in  the  contest.  I  do  not 
know  whether  it  Avas  his  office  as  Lord  Lieutenant  of  the 
County  that  procured  him  a  patient  hearing  from  both  sides, 
or  whether,  before  their  passions  were  strongly  excited,  they 
forbore  from  offering  an  indignity  to  a  person  who  from  his  age 
and  rank  derived  a  title  to  universal  respect.  He  was  the 
only  person  who  was  heard  with  scarcely  any  interruption. 

His  speech  was  exceedingly  well  delivered,  in  a  surprisingly 
clear,  sonorous,  and  audible  intonation.  He  condemned  the 
conduct  of  the  Catholics  in  the  language  of  vehement  vitupe- 
ration, but  at  the  same  time  pointed  out  the  extreme  violence 
with  which  their  demands  were  resisted.  The  only  circum- 
stance in  his  speech  worth  recording  is,  that  he  mentioned  his 
belief  that  some  measure  of  concession  was  intended  by  Gov- 
ernment.    This  attracted  great  attention  ;   and  it  is  difficult  to 

*  The  Marquis  Camden  deserves  a  passing  notice,  were  it  only  to  commem- 
orate his  praiseworthy  conduct,  as  a  sinecurist.  He  was  son  of  the  great  Earl 
Camden,  Lord  Chancellor  of  England,  1766-70.  He  was  born  in  1759,  edu- 
cated at  Cambridge,  entered  the  House  of  Commons  in  1780  ;  and,  in  the  same 
year,  was  appointed  one  of  the  Tellers  of  the  Exchequer,  a  lucrative  sinecure. 
He  succeeded  his  father  in  the  Earldom  in  1794  ;  and  soon  after  went,  as  Lord- 
Lieutenant  of  Ireland.  In  1804,  he  became  a  Cabinet  Minister,  and  quitting 
office  on  the  death  of  Pitt,  resumed  it  on  the  downfall  of  the  Greuville  admin- 
istration. He  was  rewarded  with  a  Marquisate  in  1812,  and,  when  an  outcry 
was  raised  against  sinecures,  resigned  for  the  public  good  about  thirty  thousand 
pounds  sterling  a  year,  out  of  the  proceeds  of  his  tellership.  The  whole  amount 
so  surrendered  amounted  to  about  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  pounds. 
He  was  Lord-Lieutenant,  custos-rotulorum,  and  vice-admiral  of  Kent  and  d:td 
in  1840,  aged  eighty-one. —  M. 


330  PENENDEN    HEATH    MEETING. 

conceive  Low  a  person,  so  prudent  and  so  calm  as  Lord  Cam* 
den  manifestly  is,  would  have  intimated  any  belief  of  his  upon 
the  subject,  unless  there  were  some  foundation  on  which  some- 
thing- more  substantial  than  a  mere  conjecture  could  be  raised. 
Toward  the  end  of  his  speech  the  Olubbists  became  exceed- 
ingly impatient,  and  one  of  them  called  him  "  an  old  Radical ;" 
a  term  of  which  he  protested  that  he  was  at  a  loss  to  discover 
the  applicability,  as  he  had  never  done  anything  to  please  the 
Radicals.  This  Mr.  Hunt  afterward  controverted,  and  insisted 
that  he  had  done  much  to  gratify  the  Radicals  by  giving  up 
his  sinecure  —  a  panegyric  which  was  well  merited,  and  was 
most  happily  pronounced. 

Lord  Darnley  followed  Lord  Camden,  but  was  received  with 
loud  and  vehement  hooting.  This  nobleman  is  considered  to 
be  very  proud,  without  being  arrogant,  and  to  have  as  full  con- 
sciousness of  the  dignity  and  rights  of  his  order,  as  Lord  Grey 
could  charge  any  Whig  disciple  to  entertain.  He  must  have 
been  deeply  galled  when  he  perceived  that  his  rank  and  wealth 
were  only  turned  into  scoff,  and  when  in  the  outset  of  his  speech 
a  common  boor  cried  out,  "  That  there  fellow  is  an  Hirishman. 

Tim,  put   a   potato  down  his   throat,  and   choke  his  d d 

Hirish  jaw."  He  was  not  deterred  from  going  on  by  the 
bowlings  which  surrounded  him,  and  with  far  more  intrepidity 
than  I  should  have  been  disposed  to  give  him  credit  for,  he 
proceeded  with  his  speech.  He  soon,  however,  received  a 
blow,  which  wounded  him  much  more  than  the  potato  propo- 
sition ;  for  the  moment  he  began  to  talk  of  his  estate  in 
Ireland  (where  he  has  a  very  large  property),  several  people 

cried  out,  "  Why  don't  you  live  on  your  Estate,  and  be  d d 

to   you,  and   to  every  other  d d   absentee  !       This  was  a 

thrust  which  it  was  impossible  to  parry.  Lord  Darnley  en- 
deavored to  proceed  ;  but  the  uproar  became  so  terrible,  that 
not  a  word  which  he  uttered  could  be  heard  in  the  tumult. 
\yhatever  faults  the  Olubbists  may  have  committed,  any  exces- 
sive deference  to  rank  and  wealth  was  not,  on  this  occasion  at 
least,  among  their  defects;  and  indeed,  with  the  exception  of 
Cobbett  and  Sheil,  no  man  was  listened  to  with  more  angry 
impatience   than  the  noble  Earl.     After  speaking  for  about 


RIVAL    ORATORS.  33 J 

twenty  minutes,  lie  sat  down  with  evident  marks  of  disappoint 
ment  and  personal  mortification. 

On  his  resuming  his  place,  with  a  determination,  I  should 
presume,  never  to  expose  himself  to  such  an  affront  again, 
Lord  Winchilsea  and  Mr.  Sheil  rose  together.  The  compe- 
tition for  precedence  into  which  the  Irish  demagogue  was  so 
■audacious  as  to  enter  with  the  chief  and  captain  of  the  Bruns- 
•\vickers,  excited  the  fury  of  the  latter.  Mr.  Sheil  insisted 
that,  as  Lord  Camden  had  —  as  was,  I  believe,  the  case  — 
alluded  to  him,  he  had  a  right  to  vindicate  himself;  and  there 
were  many  who  surmised  that  his  motive  for  presenting  him- 
self at  this  early  stage  of  the  proceedings  was,  that  he  had 
sent  his  speech  to  London  to  be  printed  ;  and  he  was  heard  to 
say  that  he  did  not  care  whether  the  Brunswickers  listened  to 
him,  provided  his  arguments  were  read.*  Whatever  was  his 
object,  it  was  certainly  not  a  little  presumptuous  in  a  stranger 
thus  to  enter  the  lists  with  an  Earl,  and  to  demand  a  prior 
audience.  "I  am  an  Irishman,"  said  Mr.  Sheil.  "I'll  be 
sworn  you  are,"  cried  Cobbett;  "you  are  such  a  d d  impu- 
dent fellow."  The  party  on  the  right  endeavored  to  support 
Mr.  Sheil,  and  for  a  long  time  both  Lord  Winchilsea  and  that 
gentleman  continued  to  speak  together,  amid  a  confusion  in 
which  neither  could  be  heard. 

At  length  the  Sheriff  interposed,  and  declared  that  Lord 
Winchilsea  had  first  obtained  his  eye.  That  nobleman  pro- 
ceeded to  deliver  himself  of  a  quantit}^  of  commonplace 
against  the  Catholic  religion,  amid  the  vehement  plaudits  of 
his  own  faction,  intermingled  with  strong  marks  of  disapproba- 
tion from  the  right.  "Mushroom  Lord — upstart  —  go  mind 
your  rabbits,  and  the  Papists  are  not  poachers!"  were  the 
cries  of  the  liberal  party  ;   while  the  Brunswickers  exclaimed, 

**Mr.  Sheil  had  prepared  a  long-  and  brilliant  oration,  to  be  delivered  at  the 
Penenden  Heath  Meeting-,  and  Miirdo  Young,  of  "  The  Sun"  newspaper  had 
it  published  that  evening  as  if  it  had  been  spoken.  Oaly  a  few  sentences 
were  actually  spoken,  but  the  speech,  to  the  extent  of  several  columns,  was 
Bent  all  over  the  United  Kingdom,  on  the  wings  of  the  press,  and  produced  a 
6trong  impression  whei'evcr  read.  I  recollect  that,  on  returning  from  Penenden 
Heath,  on  the  evening  of  the  meeting,  Mr.  Sheil  supped  at  the  "Sun"  office. 
and  I  had  the  gratification  of  being  one  of  the  party. —  M. 


332  PENENDEN    HEATH    MEETING. 

"Bravo,  Winchilsea !"  and  waved  their  hats,  as  with  the 
lungs  of  Stentor,  with  the  gesture  of  a  pugilist,  and  the  frenzy 
of  a  fanatic,  he  proceeded.  Although  utterly  destitute  of  idea, 
and  though  scarcely  one  distinct  notion,  perhaps,  could  be 
detected  in  his  speech,  yet  Lord  Winchilsea,  by  the  energy 
of  his  action,  and  the  impetuosity  of  his  manner,  and  the  strong 
evidences  of  rude  sincerity  about  him,  made  an  impression 
upon  his  auditors  far  greater  than  the  cold  didactic  manner  of 
Lord  Camden  or  Lord  Darnley  was  calculated  to  produce. 

There  can  be  no  greater  mistake  than  the  supposition  that 
the  English  people  are  not  fond  of  ardent  speaking,  and  of  a 
vehement  rhetorical  enunciation.  Lord  Winchilsea  is  perfectly 
denuded  of  knowledge,  reflection,  or  command  of  phrase ;  yet 
by  dint  of  strong  feeling  he  contrives  to  awaken  a  sympathy 
which  a  colder  speaker,  with  all  the  graces  of  eloquence,  could 
never  attain.  He  seems  to  be  in  downright  earnest;  and  al- 
though his  personal  vanity  may  be  an  ingredient  in  his  sincer- 
ity, it  is  certain,  whatever  be  the  cause,  that  his  ardor  and 
vehemence  are  far  more  powerful  auxiliaries  to  his  cause,  than 
the  contemplative  philosophy  of  the  Whigs,  who,  contented 
with  their  cold  integrity  of  purpose,  adopted  no  efficient  means 
to  bring  their  tenants  to  the  field,  and  encounter  their  oppo- 
nents with  the  weapons  which  were  so  powerfully  wielded 
against  them. 

After  having  whirled  himself  round,  and  having  beaten  his 
breast  and  bellowed  for  about  half  an  hour,  Lord  Winchilsea 
sat  down  in  the  midst  of  the  constitutional  acclamations  of  the 
Brunswickers  ;  and  Mr.  Sheil,  and  Mr.  Shea,  an  English  Cath- 
olic gentleman,  both  presented  themselves  to  the  Sheriff.  The 
Sheriff  gave  a  preference  to  Mr.  Shea,  who  made  a  bold  and 
manly  speech,  but  was  interrupted  by  the  continued  hootings 
of  the  Protestant  party.  The  only  fault  committed  by  Mr. 
Shea  was,  that  he  dwelt  too  long  on  the  pure  blood  of  the 
English  Catholics  —  a  topic  of  which  they  are  naturally  but  a 
little  tediously  fond  :  it  were  to  be  desired  that  this  old  blood 
of  theirs  did  not  stagnate  so  much  in  their  veins,  and  beat  a 
little  more  rapidly  in  its  circulation.  With  their  immense  for- 
tunes, and  a  little  more  exertion,  what  might  they  not  accom- 


sheil's  unspoken  oration.  333 

plish  in  influencing  the  public  mind  %  Excellent  men  in  pri- 
vate life,  they  are  not  sufficiently  ardent  for  politicians,  and 
should  remember  that  their  liberty  may  be  almost  bought,  and 
that  two  or  three  thousand  pounds  well  applied  might  have 
turned  the  Kent  meeting. 

Mr.  Shea  having  concluded,  Lord  Teynham  rose;  and  Mr, 
Sheil,  at  the  Sheriff's  request,  gave  way  to  him.  Lord  Teyn- 
ham had  been  a  Roman  Catholic*  His  name  is  Roper,  and, 
I  believe,  he  is  descended  from  Mrs.  Roper,  the  daughter  of 
Sir  Thomas  More.  He  was  assailed  with  reproaches  for  his 
apostasy  by  the  Protestants  ;  and,  though  he  made  a  very  good  . 
speech,  it  was  neutralized  in  its  effect  by  his  desertion  of  his 
former  creed.  So  universal  (however  unjust,  perhaps)  is  the 
antipathy  to  a  renegade,  that  among  the  Brunswickers  them- 
selves, his  having  ceased  to  be  a  Catholic  rendered  him  an 
object  of  scorn.  "  That  fellow's  a-going  to  shift  his  religion 
again!"  —  "Oh,  my   Lord,  there's    a   man   here   as  says  that 

what  your  Lordship's  saying  is  all  a  d d  Popish  lie!"  and 

other  ejaculations  of  the  same  character  warned  my  Lord 
Teynham  that  his  change  of  creeds  had  not  rendered  him 
more  acceptable  to  his  audience. 

Lord  Teynham  having  sat  down  amid  the  Brunswick  groans, 
Mr.  Sheil  rose  among  them.  He  Avas  vehemently  applauded 
on  the  right,  and  as  furiously  howled  at  from  the  left.  "  Down 
with  him,  the  traitor!"  —  "Down  with  the  rebel!" — "  Apolo 
gize  for  what  you  said  of  the  Duke  of  York!"  —  "Send  him 
and  O'Connell  to  the  Tower!"  —  "He  got  his  freehold  last 
night  in  Maidstone  !"  — "Down  with  him  !"  —  "  Off,  Sheil,  off !" 
—  "We're  not  the  Clare  freeholders!"  —  "See  how  the  viper 
spits!" —  "How  the  little  h animal  foams  at  the  mouth  !  take 
care  of  him,  he'll  bite  you!"  — "Off,  Sheil,  off!"  were  the 
greetings  with  which  this  gentleman  was  hailed  by  the  Bruns- 
wickers, while  his  own  party  cried  out,  "Fair  play  !" — "Oh, 
you  cowards,  you  are  afraid  to  hear  him  !" 

Of  what  Mr.  Sheil  actually  said,  it  was  impossible  to  give 
any  account;   and  the  miraculous  power  by  which  "The  Sun" 

*  Henry  Francis  Roper,  fourteenth  Lord  Teynham,  born   1760,  died   1S4? 
His  estate  in  Kent  was  called  Linsted  Lodge.—  M. 


334  PENENDEN   HEATH   MEETING. 

newspaper  of  that  night  contrived  to  publish  his  oration  in 
three  columns,  must  be  referred  to  some  Hohenloe's  interposi- 
tion in  favor  of  that  journal.  I  heard  but  one  sentence,  which 
I  afterward  recognised  in  print,  as  having  been  spoken :  "  See 
to  what  conclusion  you  must  arrive,  when  you  denounce  the 
advocates  of  Emancipation  as  the  enemies  of  their  country. 
How  far  will  your  anathema  reach?  It  will  take  in  one  half 
of  Westminster  Abbey  ;  and  is  not  the  very  dust,  into  which 
the  tongues  and  hearts  of  Pitt,  and  Burke,  and  Fox,  have 
mouldered,  better  than  the  living  hearts  and  tongues  of  those 
who  have  survived  them?  If  you  were  to  try  the  question  by 
the  authorities  of  the  illustrious  dead,  and  by  those  voices 
which  may  be  said  to  issue  from  the  grave,  how  would  you 
determine?  If,  instead  of  counting  votes  in  St.  Stephen's 
Chapel,  you  were  to  count  monuments  in  the  mausoleum  beside 
it,  how  would  the  division  of  the  great  departed  stand  ?  Enter 
the  aisles  which  contain  the  ashes  of  your  greatest  legislators, 
and  ask  yourselves  as  you  pass  how  they  felt  and  spoke,  when 
they  had  utterance  and  emotion,  in  that  senate  where  they  are 
heard  no  more:  write  '  Emancipatior'  upon  the  tomb  of  every 
advocate,  and  its  counter-epitaph  on  that  of  every  opponent 
of  the  peace  of  Ireland,  and  shall  we  not  have  a  majority  of 
sepulchres  in  our  favor?"  With  this  exception,  I  do  not  think 
that  the  Irish  demagogue  uttered  one  Avord  of  what  appeared 
in  the  shape  of  an  elaborate  essay  in  the  newspapers." 

After  having  stamped,  and  fretted,  and  entreated,  and  men- 
aced the  Brunswickers  for  half  an  hour,  during  which  he  sus- 
tained a  continued  volley  of  execrations,  Mr.  Sheil  thought  it 
prudent  to  retreat,  and  was  succeeded  by  Mr.  Larkin,  an  auc- 
tioneer from  Rochester,  who  delivered  a  very  clever  speech  in 
favor  of  radicalism,  but  had  the  prudence  to  keep  clear  of 
Emancipation.  His  occupation  afforded  a  fine  scope  for  Brims 
wick  wit.  "Knock  him  down  —  going,  going,  gone  !"  and  sim- 
ilar reminiscences,  exhibited  the  aristocracy  of  the  mob.  Mr. 
Larkin  was  not  at  all  disturbed,  but,  with  an  almost  unparal- 
leled sang-froid,  drew  a  flask  from  his  pocket,  and  refreshed 
himself  for  the  next  sentence,  when  the  uproar  was  at  its 
height. 


KNATCHBULL   AND   COBBETT.  335 

When  lie  had  finished,  Sir  Edward  Knatchbull,  the  member 
for  the  county,  and  OoLbett,  who  had  been  railing  for  hours  at 
the  long  speeches,  got  up  together.  The  Sheriff  preferred  Sir 
Edward,  upon  which  Oobbett  got  into  a  fit  of  vehement  indig- 
nation. He  accused  the  Sheriff  of  gross  partiality,  and,  while 
Sir  Edward  Knatchbull  was  going  on,  shook  his  hand  repeat- 
edly at  him,  and  exhibited  the  utmost  savageness  of  de- 
meanor and  of  aspect.  His  face  bec/ime  inflamed  with  rage, 
and  his  mouth  was  contorted  into  a  ferocious  grin.  He  grasped 
a  large  pole,  with  a  placard  at  the  head  of  it  in  favor  of  Lib- 
erty, and,  standing  with  this  apparatus  of  popularity,  which 
assisted  him  in  supporting  himself  at  the  verge  of  the  wagon, 
he  hurled  out  his  denunciations  against  the  Sheriff.  The  Brims- 
wickers  roared  at  him,  and  showered  contumely  of  all  kinds 
upon  his  head,  but  with  an  undaunted  spirit  he  persevered. 
Sir  Edward  Knatchbull  was  but  indistinctly  heard  in  the  tu- 
mult which  his  own  party  had  got  up  to  put  Oobbett  down. 
He  seems  a  proud,  obstinate,  dogged  sort  of  Squire,  Avith  an  in- 
finite notion  of  his  own  importance  as  an  English  county  mem- 
ber, and  a  corresponding  contempt  for  seven  millions  of  his 
fellow-citizens.  He  has  in  his  face  and  bearing  many  of  the 
disagreeable  qualities  of  John  Bullism,  without  any  of  its 
frankness  and  plain  dealing.  He  is  rude  without  being  honest, 
and  offensive  without  being  sincere.*  Oobbett  was  almost 
justified  in  complaining  that  such  a  man  should  be  preferred 
to  him. 

When  he  had  terminated  a  speech,  in  which  it  was  evident 
that  he  was  thinking  of  the  next  election,  at  which  the  Deer- 
ings  intended  to  dispute  the  county  with  him,  Oobbett  Avas 
allowed  by  the  Sheriff  to  proceed.  His  hilarity  was  restored 
for  a  little  while,  and  holding  out  his  petition  against  tithes, 
he  set  about  abusing  both  parties.  In  a  letter  published  in 
the  Morning  Herald,  he  takes  care,  in  his  account  of  the  meet- 

*  Sii  Edward  Knatchbull,  of  Mersham  Hatch,  Kent  (wh:ch  his  family  nave 
owned  since  the  time  of  Henry  II.),  was  bom  in  1781,  and  succeeded  1o  the 
title  in  1819.  He  eventually  abandoned  much  of  his  intolerance,  was  Paymas 
ter  of  the  Forces,  in  Peel's  last  Ministry,  and  continued  comparatively  liberal 
tyntil  his  death. —  M. 


336  PENENDEN    HEATH    MEETING. 

ing,  to  record  the  opprobrious  language  applied  by  the  multi- 
tude to  others;  but  he  omits  all  mention  of  what  was  said  of 
himself.  "  Down  with  the  old  Bone-grubber  !"— -"  Roast  him 
on  his  gridiron;"  — "  D — n  him  and  his  Indian  corn;"  were 
shouted  from  all  quarters.  He  was  not,  however,  much  dis- 
composed at  first,  for  he  was  confident  of  carrying  his  petition, 
and  retorted  with  a  good  deal  of  force  and  some  good  humor 
on  those  who  were  inveighing  against  him.  "You  cry  out  too 
weakly,  my  bucks  !"  said  he,  snapping  his  fingers  at  them. 
"You  cry  like  women  in  the  family-way.  There's  a  rascal 
there,  that  is  squeaking  at  me,  like  a  parson's  tithe-pig." 

These  sallies  amused  everybody  ;  but  still  the  roar  against 
him  continued,  and  I  was  astonished  to  see  what  little  influ- 
ence he  had  with  even  the  lower  orders  by  whom  he  was  sur- 
rounded. The  Catholic  party  looked  upon  him  as  an  enemy, 
who  came  to  divide  them,  and  the  Brunswickers  treated  him 
with  mingled  execrations  and  scorn.  At  length  he  perceived 
that  the  day  was  going  against  him,  and  his  eyes  opened  to 
his  own  want  of  power  over  the  people.  Though  he  after- 
ward vaunted  that  the  great  majority  were  with  him,  he  ap- 
peared not  to  have  above  a  dozen  or  two  to  support  his  propo- 
sition, and  when  he  sat  down,  evident  symptoms  of  mortification 
and  of  rage  against  all  parties  appeared  in  his  countenance. 
Altogether,  he  acquitted  himself  as  badly  as  can  be  well 
imagined;  and  it  seems  to  me  as  clear  that  he  is  a  most 
inefficient  and  powerless  speaker,  as  that  he  is  a  great  and 
vigorous  writer. 

Hunt  got  up  to  second  him,  and  was  received  almost  as 
badly  as  his  predecessor,  though  his  conduct  and  manner  were 
quite  opposite,  and  he  did  everything  he  could,  by  gentleness 
and  persuasiveness,  to  allay  the  fury  of  the  Brunswick  party, 
But,  after  he  had  begun,  Sir  Edward  Knatchbull  interrupted 
him  in  a  most  improper  and  offensive  manner,  which  induced 
Lord  Radnor  to  stand  up  and  reprobate  Sir  Edward's  conduct 
as  a  most  gross  violation  of  decorum.  Mr.  Hunt  went  on  ;  but, 
whatever  may  be  his  sway  with  public  assemblies  on  other 
occasions,  he  certainly  showed  few  evidences  of  omnipotence 
upon  this.     He  seemed  to  be  crest-fallen,  and  to  have  quailec) 


BKUNSWICKKBS'    TEIUMPH.  337 

under  the  force  which  was  brought  to  bear  against  him.  One 
story  he  told  well,  of  Sir  Edward  Knatchbull  having  refused 
to  pay  him  for  four  gallons  of  beer,  when  he  was  a  brewer  at 
Bristol,  because  he  had  sold  him  a  less  quantity  than  that  pre- 
scribed by  the  law  :  altogether,  his  speech,  if  it  might  be  so 
called,  when  he  was  not  allowed  to  utter  a  connected  sentence, 
was  a  complete  failure ;  but  I  am  convinced  that  no  estimate 
of  his  ability  can  be  formed  from  this  specimen  of  him,  as  his 
voice  was  stifled  by  the  faction  to  which  he  was  opposed. 
Indeed  both  parties  seemed  to  repudiate  Oobbett  and  Hunt, 
as  their  common  enemies. 

Before  Hunt  had  finished,  there  was  a  tremendous  and 
seemingly  a  preconcerted  cry  of  "  question"  from  the  Bruns- 
wickers; Hunt  went  on  speaking,  and  immense  confusion  took 
place.  Mr.  Oalcraft  interfered  in  vain.  Mr.  Hodges  and  Lord 
Radnor  then  moved  an  amendment,  declaring  that  the  measure 
should  be  left  to  the  discretion  of  the  legislature ;  and  amid  a 
tumult,  to  which  I  never  witnessed  anything  at  all  comparable, 
the  Sheriff  put  the  question.  It  has  been  stated  in  the  news- 
papers that  the  Brunswickers  had  a  great  majority ;  the  im- 
pression of  a  vast  number  of  persons  was  quite  the  reverse. 
They  were  indeed  so  well  disciplined,  that  their  show  of  hats 
was  simultaneous,  while  the  liberal  party  hardly  knew  what 
what  was  going  forward.  The  Sheriff  omitted  to  put  Cobbett's 
amendment,  which  seemed  to  be  forgotten  by  every  one  but 
himself;  and  having  announced  that  there  was  a  large  major- 
ity for  the  petition  moved  by  Mr.  Gipps,  retired  from  the  chair. 
The  acclamations  of  the  Brunswickers  were  reiterated ;  the 
whole  body  waved  their  hats,  and  lifted  up  their  voices;  the 
parsons  shook  hands  with  each  other :  the  Methodists  smiled 
with  a  look  of  ghastly  satisfaction ;  and  Lord  Winchilsea, 
losing  all  decency  and  self-restraint,  was  thrown  into  convul- 
sions of  joy,  and  leaped,  shouted,  and  roared,  in  a  state  of 
almost  insane  exultation.  The  whole  party  then  joined  in 
singing  "  God  save  the  King,"  in  one  howl  of  appropriate  dis- 
cord, and  the  assembly  broke  up. 

Thuti  ujf initiated  the  great  Kent  meeting;  to  muca.  now- 
ever,  I  conceive  that  snore  importance,  as  it  af&ci©  tb$  Oath- 

To*.  U— 14 


338  PENENDEN    HEATH    MEETING. 

olic  question,  is  attached  than  it  deserves.  I  Lave  not  room 
left  for  many  comments,  but  a  few  brief  observations  on  this 
striking  incident  are  necessary.  The  triumph  of  Protestantism 
is  not  complete.  The  whole  body  of  the  clergy,  who  are  in 
Kent  exceedingly  numerous,  were  not  only  present,  but  used 
all  their  influence  to  procure  an  attendance,  and  the  utmost 
exertions  were  employed  to  bring  the  tenantry  of  the  anti- 
Catholic  proprietors  to  the  field.  No  exertion  was  made  upon 
the  other  side.  Lord  Camden  boasted  that  he  had  not  inter- 
fered with  a  single  individual ;  yet  it  is  admitted  that  at  least 
one  third  of  the  assembly  were  favorable  to  the  Catholics. 
The  spirit  of  Lord  George  Gordon  may,  by  the  metempsycho- 
sis of  faction,  have  migrated  into  Lord  Winchilsea;  but,  while 
he  is  as  well  qualified  in  intellect  and  in  passion  to  conduct  a 
multitude  of  fanatics,  his  troops  are  of  a  very  different  charac- 
ter. Will  the  legislature  shrink  before  him?  Or  will  it  not 
rather  exclaim,  "  Contempsi  Catili7ice  gladios,  non  'partimescam 
tuos  ?"  Will  the  Government  permit  such  precedents  of  pop- 
ular excitation  to  be  held  up  ?"  and  does  it  never  occur  to 
the  Tory  party  that  the  time  may  not  be  far  distant  when 
republicanism  may  choose  Protestantism  for  its  model,  and,  by 
rallying  the  people,  act  upon  the  same  principle  of  intimida- 
tion ?  If  the  Catholics  are  to  be  put  down  by  these  means, 
may  not  the  aristocracy  be  one  day  put  down  by  similar  expe- 
dients 1  Will  the  House  of  Lords  stand  by  and  allow  all  the 
opulence  and  the  rank  of  a  large  county  to  be  trampled  upon 
by  the  multitude  ?  for  it  must  occur  to  everybody,  that  Lord 
Winchilsea  was  the  only  nobleman  on  the  side  of  the  petition- 
ers, while  the  rest  of  the  Peerage  were  marshalled  on  the 
other.  Do  the  patricians  of  England  desire  to  see  a  renewal 
of  scenes  in  which  the  nobles  of  the  land  were  treated  with 
utter  scorn,  and  the  feet  of  peasants  trod  upon  their  heads'? 
Let  statesmen  reflect  upon  these  very  obvious  subjects  of 
grave  meditation,  and  determine  whether  Ireland  is  to  be 
infuriated  by  oppression,  and  England  is  to  be  maddened  with 
fanaticism  ;  whether  they  are  not  preparing  the  way  for  the 
speedy  convulsion  of  one  country,  and  the  ultimate  revolution 
of  the  other. 


LORD-CHANCELLOR   BROUGHAM'S   LEVEE. 

Unfeigned  respect  for,  and  a  slight  personal  acquaintance 
with,  the  noble  person  who  now  holds  the  Seals,  led  me  to  at- 
tend his  last  levee.*  This  could  not  be  done  without  some 
inconvenience;  and  not  the  least  of  it  was  the  necessity  of  be- 
ing equipped  in  full  court-apparel.  I  do  not  object  to  this 
dress  —  indeed,  I  much  approve  of  it  in  those  who  mingle  in 
the  gorgeousness  of  courts  ;  but  plainer  attire  would  have  more 
befitted  the  taste  of  an  humble  incognito.  I  mention  this  fact, 
lest  it  might  be  supposed  that  I  was  guilty  of  the  not  improb- 
able gothicism  of  appearing  in  a  garb  fit  for  the  funeral,  but 
not  the  levee  of  a  Lord-Chancellor.  The  practice  of  receiving 
the  respects  of  the  public  on  one  or  two  stated  occasions  is  suf- 
ficiently ancient,  but  I  have  understood  was  discontinued,  or 
not  much  observed,  in  the  latter  days  of  Lord  Eldon.  It  was 
revived  with  somewhat  greater  splendor  by  Lord  Lyndhurst, 
but  still  it  attracted  little  public  notice.  His  Lordship  never 
secured  any  very  considerable  share  of  general  favor.  As  a 
lawyer,  lie  was  not  at  the  head,  though  among  the  chief  of  his 
profession.  For  my  own  part,  I  do  not  regard  his  secondary 
eminence  in  the  law  as  detracting  much  from  his  eminence  as 
a  public  character,  when  it  is  recollected  that  Brougham  him- 

*  This  sketch  wns  published  <n  No.  1  of  the  Metropolitan  Magazine  (May, 
1831).  which  was  started  by  Thomas  Campbell,  the  poet,  after  he  had  retired 
from  the  Editorship  of  the  Ar«cc  Monthly  Magazine,  which  he  had  held  for  a 
period  often  years.  Lord  Brougham's  first  levee  would  probably  have  been  in 
Hilary  Term,  1831,  and  the  second,  described  by  Mr.  Sheil,  at  the  commence- 
ment of  the  following  Easter  Term,  or  in  April,  1831. —  M. 


?A0  LOUD   kKOtTGHAM's    LEf  El£. 

self  ranked  much  below  Gurney,*  Pollock,  Campbell,  and  sev- 
eral others,  whose  distinction  is  derived  from  law  alone  —  the 
lowest  basis  on  which  the  fame  of  a  public  man  can  rest.  In 
politics  his  career  had  not  been  such  as  to  command  respect. 
He  was  uniformly  the  supporter  of  the  most  profitable  opinion.! 

*  The  late  Sir  John  Gumey,  long  known  as  one  of  the  best  cross-examinert 
at  the  bar,  was  made  a  puisne  judge,  and  in  that  capacity,  no  one  could  say  of 
him, 

"  Even  his  failings  leaned  to  mercy's  side," 

for  he  was  most  severe  in  his  judgments.  Sir  Frederick  Pollock  and  Lord 
Campbell  are  yet  alive t— the  first,  is  Chief  Baron  of  the  Exchequer;  the  other, 
is  Lord  Chiet  Justice  of  England,  and  obtained  a  peerage  in  June,  1841,  by 
the  scandalous  job  (already  referred  to  in  my  note3  on  the  sketch  of  Plunket) 
of  being  made  Irish  Chancellor,  for  a  few  days,  to  obtain  the  retiring  pension 
of  four  thousand  pounds  sterling,  when  the  Melbourne  Ministry,  whose  first 
law-officer  he  was,  had  no  other  means  of  quartering  him  on  the  public. —  M. 

t  Lord  Lyndhurst,  who  has  been  Lord  Chancellor  of  England  under  five  Ad- 
ministrations, is  American  by  birth,  having  been  born  at  Boston,  May  21,  1772. 
His  grandfather,  Richard  Copley,  was  an  Irishman  who  emigrated  to  America; 
John  Singleton  Copley,  this  man's  son,  born  in  Boston  in  1/38,  showed  great 
natural  taste  for  painting,  which  he  adopted  as  a  profession.  He  went  to  Eng- 
land, where  his  fine  historical  painting,  the  death  of  Lord  Chatham,  gave  him 
high  reputation.  He  painted  several  other  subject-pictures,  which  caused  him 
to  be  elected  a  Royal  Academician.  He  died  in  1815,  having  lived  to  see  the 
dawning  success  of  his  son.  The  future  Chancellor  having  eminently  distin- 
guished himself  at  Cambridge  University,  was  called  to  the  English  bar  in  1804. 
and,  at  first  was  remarkable  for  his  ultra-liberal  politics.  He  soon  became 
leader  of  his  circuit,  entered  Parliament,  adopted  Tory  views,  and  was  rewarded 
by  the  Government,  with  the  Chief  Justice  of  Chester  in  1818.  He  was  made 
Solicitor-General,  and  knighted,  in  1819,  became  Attorney -Gen era!  in  1824; 
was  made  Master  of  the  Rolls  in  1826  ;  and  wae  raised  to  the  rank  of  Lord 
Chancellor,  with  a  peerage,  as  Lord  Lyndhurst,  when  Lord  Eldon  and  five  of 
his  colleagues  simultaneously  resigned,  with  a  view  to  embarrass  Janning,  the 
new  Premier,  in  1827.  Lord  Lyndhurst  was  continued  in  the  office  of  Chancellor 
under  the  brief  administration  of  Lord  Goderich,  and  was  retained,  from  1827 
to  November,  1828,  by  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  under  whom,  in  1829,  the 
pliant  lawyer  advocated  Catholic  Emancipation,  as  strongly  as  he  had  assailed 
it  before.  In  November,  1830,  when  the  Duke's  Cabinet  broke  up,  Lyndhuist 
had  to  resign,  and  was  succeeded  by  Brougham.  In  1831,  Lord  Lyndhurst 
was  made  Chief  Baron  of  the  Exchequer,  which  he  resigned,  in  December, 
1834,  again  to  become  Lord  Chancellor.  But  Peel's  Ministry,  of  whieh  he 
was  one,  was  compelled  to  resign  in  April,  1835.  From  this  time,  until  the 
autumn  of  1841,  Lord  Lyndhurst  held  no  official  station,  but  received  his  retir- 
ing pension  of  five  thousand  pounds  sterling.     He  made  a  speech,  for  several 


Jtofeb    LYNDHURST.  341 

In  early  life  a  flagrant  Whig,  as  opening  up  the  best  field  for 
talent;  in  a  more  advanced  stage,  the  bitter  enemy  of  the 
Catholics,  so  long  as  the  star  of  Lord  Eldon,  the  great  dis- 
penser of  legal  favor,  was  in  the  ascendant;  and  finally,  •«  hen 
office  had  secured  him,  the  advocate  of  the  Catholics  on  what 
was  called  the  constitutional  ground,  when  all  favor  was  in  the 
giving  of  the  Duke  of  Wellington.* 

It  is  not  remarkable  that  the  levees  of  Lord  Lyndhnrst 
should  have  passed  off  in  quietness.  I  do  not  remember  to 
have  heard  that  the  ceremonial  was  observed  by  his  Lordship, 
although,  from  the  known  display  of  this  fashionable  lawyer, 
there  is  no  doubt  that  it  was  riot  neglected.  If,  however,  his 
levees  had  been  attended  by  the  magnificent,  it  is  equally  cer- 
tain that  the  fact  must  have  attracted  public  notoriety.  I  in- 
cline to  think  that  it  was  reserved  for  Brougham  to  illustrate 
the  ancient  custom,  by  the  splendor  of  those  who  chose  to  be 
dutiful  to  the  Lord-Chancellor.     The  fashion  of  going  to  court 

subsequent  years,  at  the  close  of  each  Parliamentary  Session,  in  which  he  ably 
and  unmercifully  exposed  the  "  sayings  and  doings"  of  the  Melbourne  Ministry. 
When  Peel  again  became  Premier,  in  1841,  Lord  Lyndhnrst,  for  the  fifth  time, 
was  made  Lord  Chancellor,  and  continued  in  office,  until  June,  184(5,  when 
the  Peel  Ministry  was  broken  up.  It  is  said  that  he  was  offered  the  Great 
Seal,  for  the  sixth  time,  in  1852,  by  Lord  Derby,  but  declined  on  the  plea  of 
advanced  years  —  having  then  reached  the  age  of  seventy.  As  a  politician, 
Lord  Lyndhurst  has  been  inconsistent  and  flexible;  as  a  parliamentary  speaker, 
severe  and  sarcastic  ;  as  an  advocate,  powerful  and  effective  ;  as  a  judge,  acute 
and  shrewd.  In  common  law,  he  has  had  few  superiors;  and  though  his  bar 
practice  was  not  in  the  Chancery  courts,  sagacity  and  great  common  sense 
marked  his  decisions  in  equity.  He  still  attends  to  his  parliamentary  duties 
[January,  1854],  but  seldom  speaks. — M. 

*  War,  to  which  Wellington  owed  his.  celebrity,  rank,  and  fortune,  has  usually 
been  an  expensive  luxury  to  John  Bull.  In  the  last  four  years  of  the  contest 
with  France,  the  cost  to  the  British  nation  was  — 1812,  £103,421,538;  1813, 
£120,952,657;  1814,  £116,843,889  ;  1815,  £116,491,051.  The  expenditure 
during  the  war,  from  1803  to  1815  inclusive,  was  £1,159,729,256.  It  was 
stated  after  the  battle  of  Waterloo,  that  young  men  in  the  United  Kingdom 
(such  as  UMially  enlist)  were  so  generally  killed  off  that  it  would  have  been 
impossible  to  raise  another  army.  I  have  heard  Doctor  Buckland,  the 
geologist,  state  (in  a  course  of  lectures  which  I  attended  when  at  Oxford),  that 
the  present  French  soldiery  owe  their  stunted  appearance  to  the  conscription 
in  the  time  of  Napoleon,  winch  drew  away  the  manhood  of  the  country,  leaving 
the  population  to  spring  from  immature  youths  or  exhausted  vieillards.—M.. 


342  lord  brougham's  levee. 

is  sncli,  that  it  infers  little  personal  respect  to  the  individual 
monarch  ;  but  the  practice  of  attending  the  levee  of  an  inferior 
personage  is  to  be  ascribed  to  the  respect  which  individual  emi- 
nence commands. 

When  Lord  Brougham  announced  his  levees,  it  could  not  be 
known  whether  he  should  receive  the  homage  of  the  aristoc- 
racy, to  whom  it  was  not  supposed  that  his  Lordship's  politics 
were  very  amicable.  It  was,  moreover,  thought  that  the  re- 
publican, or,  to  speak  more  guardedly,  the  Whig  Lord-Chan- 
cellor, would  care  little  for  a  custom  in  which  there  was  no 
manifest  utility.  He  had  declared  that  the  gewgaws  of  office 
delighted  him  not;  and  I  dare  say  he  would  fain  bring  his 
mind  to  believe  that  all  ceremonial  was  idle,  perhaps  con- 
temptible. But  it  is  the  greatest  mistake  to  suppose  that  Lord 
Brougham  is  inattentive  to  the  ceremonies  with  which  his  high 
place  is  surrounded.  A  careful  observer  will  see  clearly  that 
imposing  forms  are  perfectly  agreeable  to  his  mind  ;  nobody 
could  ridicule  form  better,  so  long  as  he  held  no  situation  which 
required  the  observance  of  customary  rules  :  but,  elevated  to 
his  present  distinction,  it  is  plain  that  he  enjoys  all  the  little 
peculiarities  of  his  office.  Somebody  said  that  he  presided  in 
the  House  of  Lords  in  a  bar-wig,  and  instanced  the  fact  as  a 
proof  of  his  reforming  temper;  but  it  was  not  true.  Accident 
may  have  obliged  him  to  take  his  seat  in  this  ungainly  form, 
but  he  had  no  purpose  of  deviating  from  the  ancient  full-bot- 
tom, and  he  is  now  to  be  seen  in  all  the  amplitude  of  the  olden 
fleece.  In  like  manner  he  observes  the  strict  regime,  so  fantas- 
tical to  a  stranger,  of  causing  counsel  to  be  shouted  for  from 
without,  although  they  are  actually  present,  and  he  adds  to 
the  oddness  of  tbtc  custom  by  receiving  them  with  a  most  im- 
posing mien,  and  putting  on  his  cJiapeau  as  they  advance. 
This  is  a,  form  for  which  the  model  is  not  to  be  found  in  the 
practice  of  his  immediate  predecessors.  It  is  possible,  how- 
ever, that  his  extensive  and  minute  reading  may  have  made 
him  aware  that  Wolsey,  perad  venture,  or  some  great  Chancel- 
lor of  old,  had  the  fancy  to  be  covered  when  the  suppliants 
approached.  Let  any  one  observe  with  what  studied  dignity 
he  performs  the  duty  of  announcing  the  royal  assent  to  acta 


HISTORY    OF   HIS    PROMOTION.  343 

of  Parliament;  lie  assumes  a  solemnity  of  tone  for  which  Lis 
voice  is  not  ill  fitted,  but  which  is  unusual  with  him.  These 
small  circumstances,  and  many  such  which  might  be  mentioned, 
show  that  state  is  not  uncongenial  to  his  mind.  Why  should  it  \ 
His  weakness  consists  in  the  unreal  contempt  for  what  is  not 
really  contemptible. 

With  his  high  notions  of  office,  I  should  have  been  surprised 
if  he  had  foregone  the  levee;  and  assuredly  he  has  not  reck- 
oned without  reason  ;  for  a  more  splendid  or  flattering  pageant 
could  not  be  witnessed  than  that  which  his  rooms  exhibited. 
Unquestionably  the  most  remarkable  man  in  the  empire  at 
this  moment,  it  is  his  fortune  to  attract  the  honorable  regards 
of  all  who  are  distinguished  as  his  compeers.  It  is  not  my  in- 
tention to  offer  any  estimate  of  what  I  conceive  to  be  his  gen- 
uine worth,  as  he  may  be  appreciated  in  a  more  dispassionate 
time;  I  speak  of  him  only  as  a  great  man  filling  a  very  large 
space  in  the  consideration  of  the  empire.  Judging  from  the 
throng  of  all  classes  upon  this  occasion,  whose  favor  is  desira- 
ble, no  man  is  more  popular.* 

*  To  us,  looking  back  upon  public  events,  it  may  now  appear  singular  that 
there  could  have  been  any  doubt,  on  the  part  of  the  Whigs,  on  taking  office, 
in  November,  1830,  of  Brougham's  claim  to  participate  in  "the  spoils."  For 
nearly  twenty  years,  he  had  been  one  of  the  leaders  of  the  liberal  party  in  the 
House  of  Commons.  In  that  capacity  none  had  more  ably  or  consistently  ad- 
vocated education,  and  parliamentary,  and  law  reform.  On  Queen  Caroline's 
trial,  he  distinguished  himself  above  all  others,  and  his  advocacy  of  her  cause, 
while  it  precluded  him  from  Court  favor,  greatly  endeared  him  to  the  public. 
In  1827,  he  strongly  supported  Canning's  Ministry,  but  declined,  it  is  said,  the 
office  of  Master  of  the  Rolls,  vacant  by  Lord  Lyndhurst's  elevation  to  the  Wool- 
sack. At  the  general  election  in  1830,  on  the  accession  of  William  IV.,  the 
great  County  of  York  returned  him,  without  his  competitor's  risking  a  contest, 
as  one  of  its  representatives.  He  pledged  himself  to  introduce  a  measure  of 
Parliamentary  Reform,  and  the  day  being  fixed  for  its  introduction,  the  Wel- 
lington Cabinet  was  beaten  into  resignation,  whereupon  Lord  Grev  was  em- 
powered to  construct  a  liberal  Government.  The  post  of  Attorney-General 
(which  is  not  held  by  one  of  the  Executive)  was  offered  to  Brougham  and  de- 
clined. It  was  an  inferior  post,  for  Lord  Grey  actually  was  afraid  of  the  great 
genius  of  the  man  who  had  emphatically  become  il  the  observed  of  all  obser- 
vers." Afraid  that  Brougham's  plan  of  Parliamentary  Reform  would  be  bolder 
and  better  than  that  promised  by  the  Whigs,  the  highest  office  was  offered  him 
find  accepted.     Or  November  22.  1834.  he  took  his  seat  in  the  House  of  Lords 


344  LOftD    BROUGHAM^S    LEVEE. 

His  levee  is  held  on  a  Saturday  evening,  at  the  unsuitable 
hour  of  ten  o'clock.  It  was  rather  late  before  I  could  come 
up,  and  I  found  the  whole  square  in  the  vicinity  of  his  resi- 
dence crowded  with  carriages.  Threading  one's  way  amid 
many  obstructions,  I  reached  the  house,  and  which  (to  observe 
on  a  matter  so  small)  I  should  remark  is  not  very  suitable  for 
the  residence  of  either  its  former  (Earl  Grey)  or  present  occu- 
pant. It  is  expected  that  a  noble  aristocrat  should  be  found 
in  ample  halls,  surrounded  by  suitable  magnificence,  but  this 
is  not  the  house  in  which  the  lordly  capital  of  the  peers  should 
be  lodged.  The  principal  rooms  are  of  moderate  dimensions, 
and  the  suite  consists  only  of  two.  It  was  not  surely  in  this 
house  that  Lord  Byron  found  the  family  of  Lord  Grey,  when 
he  formed  the  very  exalted  opinion  of  their  patrician  accom- 
plishments to  which  he  gives  expression  in  one  of  his  letters. 

The  preparations  for  announcement  were  those  which  are 
usually  observed.  The  Chancellor  took  his  place  at  a  corner 
of  the  room,  backed  by  his  chaplain,  and  was  soon  encircled 
by  the  visitants ;  his  dress  remarkably  plain,  being  a  simple 
suit  of  velvet  in  the  court  cut.  The  names  were  announced 
from  the  bottom  of  the  stairs,  and  each  person  as  he  entered 
walked  up  to  the  Chancellor  and  offered  his  respects.  The  num- 
bers were  so  great,  that  it  was  impossible  to  devote  any  marked 
attention  to  each  ;  as  soon,  therefore,  as  the  visiter  had  made 
his  bow,  he  retired  into  the  throng,  or  took  his  departure  through 
the  adjoining  room.  I  was  not  present  at  the  first  of  the  levees 
which  were  held,  and  at  which  the  attendance  was  very  dis- 
tinguished ;  but  a  friend  who  was,  spoke  very  highly  of  the 
manner  in  which  the  Chancellor  performed  his  noviciate. 

The  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  came  early,  and  was  very 
kindly  received.  He  was  followed  by  the  Archbishop  of  York 
and  several  other  bishops,  whose  attendance  gave  proof  that, 
differ  as  they  might  from  Lord  Brougham,  they  surely  did  not 

as  Baron  Brougham  and  Vaux,  and  Lord  High-Chancellor  of  England.  He 
held  this  office  for  four  years,  namely,  until  November,  1834.  While  Lord 
Erskine's  Chancery  Judgments  are  laughed  at  as  "  the  Apocryphal  Volume.'' 
those  of  Lord  Brougham,  collected  and  edited  by  Charles  Purton  Cooper,  the 
eminent  Chancery  barrister,  are  constantly  referred  to,  as  authority. —  M. 


"the  iron  DUKE."  O±0 

consider  him  an  enemy  to  the  Church.*  There  is  something 
uncommonly  bland  in  the  appearance  and  expression  of  the  Pri- 
mate ;  he  is  the  very  reverse  of  the  full-blown  dignitary  who 
is  commonly  seen  in  high  places.  One's  notions  of  a  bishop 
are  apt  to  be  those  which  we  entertain  of  a  high-feeding  drone 
—  with  little  duty  that  is  of  much  real  consequence,  but  with  a 
most  exalted  notion  of  such  duty  as  he  is  called  on  to  dis- 
charge. Not  so  the  present  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  :  I  mis- 
take his  character  extremely  if  he  is  not  a  meek  as  well  as  a 
highly-accomplished  servant  of  his  Master.  I  know  not 
how  he  ascended  to  the  primacy,  but  I  am  sure  that  it  is 
not  dishonored  in  his  hands.  Brougham  evidently  likes  his 
Grace. 

The  most  remarkable  visiter  of  that  evening  was  the  Duke 
of  Wellington.  The  crowd  was  astonished,  and  I  dare  say 
the  Chancellor  himself  was  surprised,  when  his  name  was  sent 
up.  I  doubt  if  they  had  ever  met  m  the  same  room  before. 
Their  political  lives,  with  the  exception  of  the  Catholic  ques- 
tion, were  one  unvarying  ccurse  of  opposition,  if  not  enmity. 
I  suspect  that  for  a  time  the  Duke  despised  the  talk  of  the 
lawyer;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  Brougham  had  often  declared 
that  the  respect  which  he  entertained  for  military  glory  was 
not  very  lofty.  Some  of  his  bitterest  tirades  were  levelled  at 
the  Duke  personally.  No  one  will  deny  that  it  was  high- 
minded  in  the  Duke  to  lay  aside  resentment  of  every  sort,  and 
offer  this  mark  of  respect  as  well  to  the  man  as  the  office.  The 
Chancellor  was  flattered  by  the  attention,  and  shook  the  Duke 
by  the  hand  very  cordially.  There  is  not  much  heartiness  of 
manner  about  the  Duke,  whatever  may  be  the  reality  ;  and 
his  dry  features,  thinned  by  the  great  labors  in  which  his  life 
has  been  passed,  do  not  easily  or  readily  relax  into  a  smile ; 
but  on  this  occasion  it  was  remarked  that  his  countenance  was 
more  expressive  of  good-will  than  usual.t     He  engaged  in  con- 

*  Dr.  Howley,  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  died  in  1848. —  Dr.  Hareour:. 
Archbishop  of  York,  died  in  1847. —  M. 

t  Brougham  and  Wellington  subsequently  became  intimate  friends.  On  one 
occasion,  Brougham  publicly  described  Wellington  as  "  the  most  magnanimous 
of  men.'* — M 

5» 


M6  LOED    BROUGHAm's   LTCV$£. 

versation  for  a  minute  or  two  with  the  Chancellor,  and  then 
gave  place  to  the  subsequent  visiters  who  pressed  for  audience. 
His  Grace  immediately  joined  some  military  friends  who  had 
previously  been  received. 

Not  the  least  remarkable  personage  in  the  room  was  the 
Lord-Advocate  of  Scotland.*  Brougham  and  he  are  very  old 
friends,  and  have  been  much  engaged  in  the  same  species  of 
literature.  Lord  Brougham  was  his  predecessor  in  the  editor- 
ship of  the  "Edinburgh  Review"  —  a  fact  which  is  not  gener- 
ally known,  but  which  is  certain.  Brougham  was  not  the  first 
editor,  having  filled  that  office  for  a  short  time  after  Sydney 
Smith  withdrew  from  the  situation.  Jeffrey  appeared  ex- 
tremely petit  in  his  court-dress,  and  did  not  seem  very  much 
at  home  ;  he  was  acquainted  with  but  few  of  his  fellow-visiters,* 
and  had  too  much  good  taste  to  occupy  much  of  the  Chancel- 
lor's attention.  They  did  not  seem  to  hold  any  conversation 
beyond  the  usual  commonplace  inquiries. 

Ascending  the  stairs,  I  was  met  by  a  hobbling  old  Lord  — 
Carnarvon  by  name.  There  is  nothing  very  courtly  or  digni- 
fied in  the  appearance  of  this  nobleman.t  He  has  been  a 
Whig  the  greater  part  of  his  life,  but  affects  to  be  greatly  dis- 
mayed at  the  Reform  Bill;  and  has  more  than  once  run  a  tilt 
against  the  Ministers,  but  with  no  very  marked  success.  Arm- 
in-arm  with  Lord  Carnarvon  came  the  gay  and  the  good-look- 

*  Francis  Jeffrey,  was  born  in  1773,  and  was  one  of  Sir  Walter  Scott's  con- 
temporaries and  early  associates.  Called  to  the  bar  in  1794,  he  soon  obtained 
a  high  reputation  for  eloquence,  and  gradually  got  into  practice,  but  was  chiefly 
eminent,  during  nearly  thirty  years,  for  his  connection  with  the  Edinburgh  Re- 
view, as  contributor  and  editor.  The  first  number  appeared  October  25,  1802. 
and  three  editions  were  exhausted  in  as  many  weeks.  It  soon  became,  what 
it  has  ceased  to  be,  the  able  and  recognised  ar^&n  of  the  liberal  party  in  Great 
Britain.  In  182.9,  when  the  profession  chose  him  Dean  of  the  Faculty  (of  law), 
Jeffrey  retired  from  the  Review.  In  1830,  he  was  appointed  Lord-Advocate  ot 
Scotland,  under  the  Grey  Ministry,  and  entered  Parliament,  where  he  by  no 
means  distinguished  himself.  In  1834,  he  was  promoted  to  the  Scottish  bench, 
where,  applying  all  the  great  powers  of  his  mind  to  the  task,  he  became  one 
of  the  best  Judges  that  ever  adorned  that  high  station.      He  died  in  18-50, — M. 

t  Henry  George  Herbert,  second  Earl  of  Carnarvon,  born  in  1772.  died  In 
1833,  aged  sixty-one.  His  son  and  successor,  then  Lord  Porchester,  had  dis- 
tinguish?! himself  as  the  author  of  "  The  Moor,"  and  other  poems. —  M. 


A   BATCH    OF    NOBLES.  347 

ing  Earl  of  Errol,*  blooming  with  the  most  healthful  roseate; 
and  immediately  behind  followed  Sir  Robert  Wilson.  Time 
and  hard  service  have  made  little  impression  on  a  set  of-  not 
very  extraordinary  features.  There  is  a  buoyancy  about  this 
historic  soldier  which  bespeaks  a  good  heart.t  He  seems  to 
have  lost  much  of  his  fancy  for  senatorial  display;  and,  truth 
to  tell,  Parliament  is  not  the  place  of  all  others  in  which  he 
has  been  destined  to  shine.  He  is  one  of  the  few  whose  hard 
fortune  in  less  auspicious  times  has  stood  him  in  good  part  in 
later  days. 

On  entering  the  room,  I  was  struck  by  the  superior  brilliancy 
of  the  military  costumes,  always  the  most  prominent  at  such 
times.  Military  rank  is  both  common  and  honorable,  and  its 
apparel  seems  to  be  in  favor  with  all  classes.  Hence  it  is  that 
many,  such  as  the  lieutenants  of  counties,  whose  duty  is  exclu- 
sively of  a  civil  nature,  adopt  the  fashions  of  the  army.  There 
were  half  a  dozen  Lords-Lieutenant  in  the  room,  among  whom 
I  particularly  observed  the  Duke  of  Argyle.f  I  am  told  that 
his  Grace  is  a  man  of  talent;  and  his  fine  features,  the  remains 
of  what  rendered  the  Marquis  of  Lorn  one  of  the  most  eminent- 
ly handsome  men  of  his  time,  are  now  thoughtful  and  melan- 
choly. The  present  Administration  has  given  the  Great  Seal 
of  Scotland   to  the  Duke  of  Argyle  ;   and  in  duty  he  is  found 

*  The  late  Lord  Errol  (whose  Earldom  was  created  in  1453),  was  Heredi- 
tary Lord  High  Constable  of  Scotland,  which  is  the  highest  hereditary  distinc 
tion  in  the  United  Kingdom,  after  those  of  the  Royal  Family.  He  married  one 
of  the  illegitimate  daughters  of  William  IV.  and  Mrs.  Jordan,  the  actress,  and 
died  in  184G,  aged  forty-five. —  M. 

t  Sir  Robert  Wilson,  who  much  distinguished  himself  by  his  military  services 
from  17.93  to  1815,  aided  in  the  escape  of  Lavalett.e,  from  Paris,  in  the  latte? 
year.  In  1821,  for  taking  the  popular  side,  at  the  funeral  of  Queen  Caroline, 
he  was  dismissed  from  the  British  army.  A  public  subscription  indemnified 
him  from  the  pecuniary  loss,  and  he  was  reinstated  some  years  after.  Frorr. 
1818  to  1831  he  represented  Southwark  in  Parliament.  In  1841,  he  was  raised 
to  the  rank  of  full  General.  In  1842,  he  was  appointed  Governor  of  Gibraltar, 
and  had  just  returned  from  that  post,  after  seven  years'  of  command,  when  he 
died  suddenly,  May,  1849,  aged  seventy-two. —  M. 

t  The  sixth  Duke  of  Argyle,  born  in  1768,  married  Lady  Caroline  Villiers 
(who  had  previously  been  the  wife  of,  and  had  obtained  a  divorce  from,  the 
Marijuis  of  Anglesey),  and  died  in  October,  1839, —  ]Vff 


348  lord  brougham's  levee. 

at  the  levee  of  its  Chancellor.  Along  with  his  Grace  were 
several  other  peers  of  ducal  rank,  but  whose  fortunes  were  no 
way  interesting  to  me. 

After  I  had  paid  my  respects  to  the  Chancellor,  there  came 
tripping  up  the  Marquis  of  Bristol*  with  a  springy  step,  which 
he  must  surely  have  acquired  at  the  old  court  of  France ;  for  I 
am  sure  that  no  such  movement  could  be  attained  on  English 
ground.  The  elasticity  of  this  noble  Lord  was  such  that,  when 
once  put  in  motion,  he  continued  to  spring  up  and  down  in  the 
manner  of  the  Chinese  figures  which  are  hawked  by  the  Ital- 
ian toy-venders.  Had  I  been  told  that  the  head  of  the  house 
of  Newry  was  a  dancing-master,  who  had  not  yet  learned  the 
present  modes,  I  should  certainly  have  believed  the  story  with- 
out scruple  if  I  had  met  him  anywhere  else. 

He  had  no  sooner  left  the  Chancellor,  than  he  was  laid  hold 
of  by  a  fidgetty  solicitor,!  who  was  the  only  member  of  his 
class  in  the  room,  and  who,  I  understand,  is  a  sort  of  favorite 
of  the  Chancellor.  The  obsequious  grin  and  the  affected  ease 
of  this  worthy  do  not  convey  any  very  favorable  impression 
on  his  behalf.  He  was  solicitor  for  the  Queen,  and  in  this 
capacity  had  formed  an  intimacy  with  her  chief  counsel,  which 
an  ill-natured  person  would  perhaps  think  makes  him  now  for- 
get in  some  measure  the  great  disparity  between  their  present 
condition.  The  Chancellor  gave  no  discouragement  to  his  fa- 
miliarity. 

A  certain  Sir  Something  Noel  came  up  immediately  after- 
ward, of  whom  nothing  more  remarkable  could  be  told  than 
that  he  was  the  relative  of  Lady  Byron  ;  and  is,  I  suppose,  the 
same  person  of  whom  Byron  expresses  himself  favorably  when 
a  temporary  illness  of  his  lady  shortly  after  their  marriage 

*  Nephew  of  the  celebrated  Earl  of  Bristol,  Bishop  of  Derry,  of  whom  men- 
don  lias  already  been  made.  In  June,  1826.  he  was  created  Marquis.  He  is 
yet  alive  (January,  1854),  and  is  aged  eighty-four. —  M. 

t  This  "  fidgetty  Solicitor"  was  William  Vizard,  subsequently  made  Secretary 
of  Bankrupts  by  Lord  Brougham,  in  1832,  a  post  worth  twelve  hundred  pounds 
sterling-  a  year,  which  he  occupied  for  twenty  years  (until  1852),  and  then 
contrived  to  get  appointed,  on  its  abolition,  to  an  office  equally  valuable,  which 
he  retains.  His  connection  with  the  Queen's  trial  made  Wilhar°  Vizard's  for*  - 
tujie.  and  he  is  now  a  large  landed  proprietor  in  Gloucestershire. —  M. 


SIR    JAMES   SCARLETT.  349 

looked  rather  gestatory.*  A  variety  of  lords,  squires,  generals, 
ossa  mnominata,  followed,  for  whom  the  Chancellor  cared  per- 
haps about  as  much  as  I  did. 

At  length  Sir  James  Scarlett  was  announced,  and  the  Chan- 
cellor left  his  place  to  meet  him.  His  welcome  was  very 
hearty.  Brougham  was  doubtless  gratified  by  this  token  of 
respect  from  a  man  who  was  indisputably  his  leader  in  the 
courts, f  and  for  whose  forensic  abilities  it  is  known  that  he 
entertains,  and  has  often  expressed,  the  highest  admiration. 
The  position  of  the  two  men  was  singular,  and  to  the  ex-attor- 
ney not  very  enviable.  Scarlett  was  in  high  practice  before 
Brougham  was  even  called  to  the  bar.  He  kept  ahead  of  him 
in  their  profession  throughout;  and  twice  he  had  filled  the 
first  places  at  the  bar,  when  the  respective  attainments  of  these 
eminent  persons  were  such,  that  if  Brougham  had  been  placed 
before  him,  Scarlett  would  have  had  just  ground  of  complaint, 
and  the  bar  would  have  unanimously  decried  the  appointment. 
Now.  however,  by  one  of  those  cross-accidents  which  will  occur 
in  the  most  fortunate  lives,  Scarlett  was,  with  strict  justice  and 
universal  acquiescence,  placed  below  his  former  competitor, 
and  in  direct  opposition  to  all  the  early  friends  with  whom  he 

#  Sir  Ralph  Milbanke's  wife  was  sister  of  Viscount  Wentworth,  and  she  suc- 
ceeded to  the  estates,  on  condition  that  her  name  should  be  changed  to  Noel. 
Her  daughter  was  married  to  Lord  Byron,  who  prefixed  the  name  of  Noel  to 
his  own.  on  his  mother-in-law's  death.  Sir  Ralph  Noel  died  in  1825,  and  Mr. 
Sheil  alludes  to  his  relative  and  successor,  Sir  John  Peneston  Milbanke,  who 
dropped  the  name  of  Noel  altogether. — M. 

t  Perhaps  this  is  the  place  where  I  should  state  the  cost  of  the  administration 
of  justice,  which  forms  an  important  item  in  the  national  expenditure  of  Grea; 
Britain.  In  1852,  as  appears  by  Parliamentary  returns,  the  whole  amount  was 
£2,104,196,  of  which  £645,243  was  for  Courts  of  Justice  (including  salaries 
of  Judges  and  other  officials),  £891,542  for  police  and  criminal  prosecution, 
and  £567,  111  for  correction.  In  October,  1853,  the  Reverend  Mr.  Clay,  chap- 
lain of  the  House  of  Correction  in  Preston  (England)  in  his  annual  report  to  the 
magistrates,  estimates  the  loss  caused  to  the  public  by  fifteen  pickpockets,  wliose 
career  he  has  traced,  including  the  value  of  the  property  stolen,  expenses  o: 
prosecution,  and  maintenance  in  jail,  at  £26,500.  That  is  to  say,  England 
was  at  an  expense  of  £1,766  for  each  of  these  worthies— a  sum,  one  tithe 
of  which,  if  judiciously  applied  at  the  proper  time,  would  probably  have  suf- 
ficed to  make  them  useful  members  of  society. —  M. 


350  LORD   BROTJGHAJVIS   LEVEE. 

commenced  bis  political  career.*  It  was  matter  of  necessity 
and  of  course  that  he  should  go  out  when  his  employers  were 
obliged  to  surrender  office ;  and  no  man  could  complain  that 
Brougham  should  then  be  elevated  to  a  distinction,  which  in 
other  circumstances  Scarlett  might  have  thought  his  own  by 
indisputable  right.  The  Chancellor  remained  longer  in  con- 
versation with  Sir  James  than  any  of  the  other  distinguished 
persons  who  appeared.  Indeed,  his  anxiety  to  show  this  at- 
tention produced  rather  awkward  effects.  While  they  were 
closely  together,  Jocky  Bell,  as  he  is  commonly  called,  the 
very  eminent  Chancery  barrister,  came  in  sight;  but  he  was 
suffered  to  waddle  about  for  some  time  before  he  caught  the 
eye  of  the  Chancellor.!  Before  the  conversation  with  Sir 
James  was  finished,  there  were  a  good  many  others  in  the 
same  unreceived  plight,  and  the  Chancellor  was  obliged  to  give 
them  a  hasty  discharge. 

The  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Commons  was  then  announced. 
Brougham  and  he  met  as  warm  friends,  though  certainly  men 
having  little  in  kindred.  In  point  of  talent  there  is  no  ground 
of  comparison  ;  yet  it  may  be  doubted  whether  they  are  not 
nearly  as  great  in  their  own  way.  I  have  no  notion  of  the 
place  which  the  Speaker  held  in  Parliament  before  he  was 
elected  to  the  chair,  and  I  know  few  situations  which  require 

*  It  was  said  thai  Scailett,  afterward  Lord  Abinger,  "  ratted"  at  the  wrong 
time.  He  had  been  liberal  in  politics  up  to  1828  (and  had  been  Canning's 
Attorney-General  in  1827).  but  took  office  with  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  then 
an  avowed  Tory,  and  was  as  intolerant  as  renegades,  whether  politic!  or  reli- 
gious, usually  are.  In  1830.  when  the  Whigs  came  into  power,  Scarlett  had 
to  resign  office.  But.  in  December,  1834,  when  the  post  of  Chief-Baron  of 
the  Exchequer  became  vacant  by  Lord  Lyndhurst's  taking  the  Great  Seal. 
Scarlett  was  appointed,  receiving  a  peerage  shortly  after,  and  continued  Judge 
until  his  death  in  1844. —  Had  he  remained  with  the  Whig  party,  le  would 
probably  have  been  appointed  their  Lord  Chancellor  in  1830. —  M. 

t  "  Jock  Bell,"  as  he  was  called,  was  a  friend  and  contemporary  of  Lord 
Eldon's.  He  was  notorious  for  writing  so  badly  that  it  was  said  he  wrote 
three  hands  :  one,  which  nobody  but  himself  could  read  ;  a  second  (that  in 
which  he  gave  his  opinion  on  cases)  which  none  but  his  clerk  could  deciphei, 
and  a  third  which  neither  himself  nor  clerk  could  make  out.  It  is  a  fact, 
and  the  foundation  of  a  passage  in  "  Pickwick,"  that  Jock  Bell's  clerk  real- 
ized a  large  income  by  making  readable  copies  of  his  employer's  opinions, 
which  wei  3  greatly  in  request,  on  account  of  their  ability.— M, 


THK   SPBAKKR.  351 

more  tact  and  management.  In  tliese  qualifications  the  pres- 
ent Speaker  is  signally  gifted.*  He  brings  a  degree  of  good- 
nature to  tLe  office  which  no  event,  however  untoward,  can 
ruffle  :  his  calmness  never  forsakes  him ;  he  is  the  same  easy, 
dignified  chairman  at  all  times.  The  Commons  are  a  truly 
turbulent  body,  but  they  are  not  impatient  of  bis  sway.  In 
all  emergencies  he  is  vigorously  supported  :  in  his  hands,  the 
authority  of  bis  office,  though  rarely  exercised,  has  lost  none 
of  its  force.  Brougham  himself  was  one  of  the  most  fiery 
spirits  in  this  hot.  region  ;  but  a  word  from  the  Speaker  would 
calm  him  in  an  instant.  Among  other  qualifications  for  com- 
mand, he  is  possessed  of  a  fine,  mellow,  deep-toned  voice, 
which,  while  it  powerfully  enunciates  "  Order,"  frees  the 
command  from  all  harshness  or  severity.  As  the  first  com- 
moner in  die  land,  and  a  truly  estimable  gentleman,  he  was 
entitled  to  be  well  received.  But  I  doubt,  if  deprived  of  his 
chair,  whether  he  could  insure  much  regard  on  the  score  of  his 
talents.  Let  me  not,  however,  shade  the  picture  which  I  have 
already  drawn  ;  it  is  manifest  that  Mr.  Sutton  is  a  general  fa- 
vorite. Every  one  Avas  eager  to  pass  a  minute  or  two  with 
him.  I  was  much  pleased  to  witness  a  frank  greeting  between 
him  and  old  William  Smith,  who  is  not  now  in  the  House  of 
Commons ;  but  who,  before  he  left  it,  enjoyed  the  patriarchal 
rank  of  being  the  father  of  the  body.t  The  Speaker  told  him 
that  they  had  not  much  mended  since  he  left.  Longer  speeches 
—  more  of  them  —  later  hours,  and  fewer  divisions  —  were  the 
characteristics  of  the  session,  compared  with  its  predecessors. 

Lord  Farnham,f  a  bluff,  weather-beaten  old  Irish  Lord  — 
the  unflinching  enemy  of  the  Catholics,  and  the  equally-deter- 

*  Charles  M;mners  Sutton,  speaker  of  the  House  of  Commons  from  1817  to 
1834;  created  Viscount  Canterbury  in  1835;  and  died  July,  1845.  He  was 
very  popular  as  speaker,  and  allowed  himself  to  be  re-elected  (after  the  Reform 
Bill  was  passed  in  1832)  at  the  especial  request  of  the  Grey  Ministry. —  M 

t  This  William  Smith,  who  had  a  seat  in  Parliament  for  forty-six  years,  was 
latterly  Member  for  Ncrwich.  He  attacked  Southey.  in  Parliament,  as  a  "  ran- 
corous renegade,"  and  was  replied  to  by  the  poet  in  nervous  and  indignant 
prose.  William  Smith  was  ultra-liberal  in  politics.  He  died  in  1835,  aged 
seventy-nine. —  M. 

t  John  Barry  Maxwell,  fifth  Lord  Fandiam,  horn  in  1767,  died  in  1838.—  M. 


352  lord  brougham's  leyee. 

mined  enemy  of  Reform  —  got  hold  of  the  Speaker;  and,  in 
the  course  of  a  brief  conversation,  the  latter  informed  Men  that 
for  eight  entire  days  and  nights  he  had  never  been  from  under 
the  roof  of  the  House  of  Commons.  The  House  had  been  sit- 
ting from  three  o'clock  in  the  afternoon  till  three  and  four 
o'clock  in  the  morning;  and  then  the  business  of  the  commit- 
tees commenced  at  ten  o'clock,  to  which  he  was  obliged  to 
give  a  good  deal  of  attention.  He  spoke  of  the  labor  as  being 
greater  than  any  physical  strength  could  endure.  When  this 
fact  is  known,  it  ceases  to  be  wonderful  that  he  should  be 
anxious,  as  has  been  long  reported,  to  exchange  the  conspicu- 
ous and  most  honorable  situation  which  he  now  holds,  for  that 
of  the  youngest  peerage,  and  become  second  to  such  insignifi- 
cancies  as  Bexley  and  Sidmouth.*  Leaving  Farnham,  the 
Speaker  was  engaged  for  a  short,  time  with  Lord  Nugent  and 
the  Marquis  of  Clanricarde.i  Both  of  these  noble  Lords  ap- 
peared in  the  splendid  costume  which  I  believe  is  characteris- 
tic of  the  diplomatic  corps.  Nugent  is  evidently  a  person  of 
the  most  accomplished  manners.  The  perpetual  play  of  good- 
humor  on  his  agreeable  features  shows  that  the  severity  of  his 
politics  does  not  arise  from  any  harshness  of  disposition.  It 
will  be  recollected  that  he  was  the  subject  of  one  of  Canning's 
pleasantries  in  regard  to  the  Portuguese  expedition  ;  which, 
however,  had  little  point,  unless  his  Lordship  had  been  a  very 
stout  man  —  but  this  is  not  the  fact.  A  much  larger  person 
than  Lord  Nugent  would  have  occasioned  no  inconvenience  to 

*  The  late  Nicholas  Vansittart,  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer,  from  1S12  tc 
1823,  was  created  Baron  Bexley.  Henry  Addington,  successively  Speaker. 
Premier,  and  Home  Secretary,  was  created  Viscount  Sidmouth  in  1805,  and 
died  in  1844.—  M. 

t  Lord  Nugent,  born  in  1789,  sat  in  Parliament  over  twenty  years;  was 
Lord-Commissioner  of  the  Ionian  Islanels  fiom  1832  to  1835  ;  and  died  in 
November,  1850.  His  politics  were  liberal,  and  he  had  considerable  literary 
taste. —  The  Marquis  of  Clanriearde,  Canning's  son-in-law,  was  born  in  1802, 
represents  the  De  Burgh  or  Burke  family,  and  claims  to  be  descended  from 
Charlemagne.  He  has  been  Ambassador  to  Russia,  and  Postmaster-General. 
Before  183 J,  there  was  a  good  deal  of  town-talk  about  a  young  man  of  prop- 
erty having  been  "  pigeoned'"  at  cards,  at  Richmond,  near  London,  anel  it  wa» 
said  that  Lord  Clanriearde  was  one  of  the  party ;  but  the  scandal  biew  ovei 
and  no  nroof  was  given  of  the  imputations  en  "  the  noble  Marquis."— M. 


LORD    DENMAN.  353 

the  heavy  Falmouth  van.  Lord  Claiiricarcle  is  only  remarka- 
ble for  his  connection  with  Canning.  His  countenance  is  any- 
thing but  pleasing:  his  fondness  for  play  is  well  known,  and 
had  at  one  time  placed  him  in  a  disagreeable  dilemma. 

The  last  person  of  note  who  arrived,  before  I  departed,  wa3 
Sir  Thomas  Denman.*  The  Chancellor  was  engaged  with 
some  one  at  the  moment,  and  nothing  passed  between  them 
but  an  exchange  of  bows.  It  was  nearly  ten  years  since  I  had 
seen  Brougham  and  Denman  together:  the  Queen's  trial  was 
then  the  all-engrossing  topic  of  public  consideration.  Who 
could  then  have  foretold  that  these  men  would  have  in  so  short 
a  space  won  the  confidence  of  a  sovereign,  whom  they  attacked 
with  a  degree  of  virulence  which,  even  in  those  days  of  party 
violence,  was  generally  condemned  1  The  change  in  feeling 
is  creditable  alike  to  all. 

*  Thomas  Denman,  bom  in  February,  1779,  and  created  Baron  Denman,  of 
Dovedale,  in  the  County  Derby,  in  Match,  1834,  was  son  of  a  physician  in  Lon- 
don. He  was  called  to  the  bar  in  1806  ;  went  the  Midland  circuit,  entered 
Parliament  in  1818:  became  Solicitor-General  to  Queen  Caroline  in  1820;  was 
elected  Common  Sergeant  of  London,  in  1822  ;  was  made  King's  Counsel. 
with  a  patent  of  precedency,  in  1826  ;  was  made  Attorney-General,  under  the 
Grey  Ministry  in  1830:  was  made  Chief  Justice  of  England  in  1832;  raised 
to  the  peerage  in  1834  :  and  compelled,  under  Lord  John  Russell's  Ministry,  ir. 
1850.  to  resign,  on  the  plea  of  advanced  years,  to  make  room  for  Lord  Camp- 
bell (only  two  years  his  junior),  for  whom  a  job  of  the  same  character  had  beer 
perpetrated,  in  1841.  when  Lord  Phuiket  was  literally  turned  out  of  the  Irish 
Chancellorship,  in  order  to  give  Lord  Campbell  a  legal  claim  to  a  life-pension 
of  four  thousand  pounds  sterling.  As  an  advocate,  Denman  was  bold  and  elo- 
quent; his  denunciation,  on  the  Queen's  trial,  of  the  Duke  of  Clarence  (after- 
ward William  IV.)  as  a  "  royal  slanderer,"  was  decided  and  fearless  —  ten  yean- 
afterward,  this  prince,  as  Sovereign,  accepted  Denman  as  his  first  law  officer. 
As  a  judge,  he  was  just  and  constitutional.  In  politics,  he  has  always  beer, 
liberal.  In  Parliament,  he  was  a  ready  debater.  During  the  Reform  Bill  dis- 
cussions. Sir  C.  Wetherell  compared  Old  Sarum  (for  which  three  men  elected 
two  members)  to  Macedon.  "Yes,"  replied  Denman,  "  Macedon  was  ruled 
bv  an  Alexander:''  —  an  East  India  Director,  named  Alexander,  being  one  of 
the  (so-called)  representatives  of  this  nominal  boi'ough,  with  one  house,  three 
voters,  and  two  Members,  while  Manchester,  population  four  hundred  thon- 
9and,  was  wholly  unrepresented M. 


STATE  OF  PARTIES  IN  DUBLIN,  IN  1831. 

On  the  5 th  of  this  month  of  May  [1S31],  my  business  led  me 
into  the  Four  Courts,  Dublin  ;  and  on  the  way,  by  a  train  of 
associations  too  obvious  to  require  to  be  analyzed,  my  mind 
involuntarily  reverted  to  the  past,  and  took  note  of  the  vicis- 
situdes produced  since  I  last  wrote.  But  it  was  only  ,»..hen 
I  found  myself  in  that  emporium  of  law,  and  politics,  and  gos- 
sip—  the  Hall  of  the  Four  Courts  —  that  I  felt  in  all  th  en- 
force the  variety  and  extent  of  those  mutations.  The  scene 
and  the  majority  of  the  actors  were  still  the  same,  and  the 
general  resemblance,  at  the  first  view,  appeared  unimpaired  ; 
but,  upon  a  nearer  scrutiny,  how  striking  and  singular  had 
been  the  changes ! 

Of  these  actors,  for  instance,  one  of  the  first  that  attracted 
my  attention  was  Mr.  William  Bellew,  a  Roman  Catholic  bar- 
rister of  great  personal  respectability,  and  of  just  repute  in  cer- 
tain departments  of  his  profession.     In  his  general  aspect  there 
was  little  perceptible  alteration.     Time,  as  if  from  a  kindly 
feeling   toward   an  old  acquaintance,  seemed   to  have  spared 
him  more  than  younger  men.     I  found  the  same  spire-like  alti- 
tude of  frame  ;  the  same  solemn,  spectral  stride  ;  the  same  grave 
and  somewhat  querulous,  but  not  undignified  cast  of  feature 
"In  his  own  proper  person,"  in  face  and  form,  Mr.  Bellew  was 
such  as  I  had  seen  him  in  his  penal  days;  but  what  a  transfig- 
uration had  been  accomplished  in  his  gown  !     How  omnipo- 
tent must  have  been  that  act  of  Parliament  which  had  substi- 
tuted his  present  rustling  silk  attire   for  the  dingy,  tattered 
fustian,  in  which  I  had  so   often  seen  him  haunting  the  pre- 
cincts of  the  Court  of  Chancery,  and  which  he  had  vowed  to 


NICHOLAS   PUfcCEL   o'goRMAN.  355 

Wear  while  a  rag  of  it  remained,  as  an  ensign  of  reproach  to 
the  presiding  bigot  of  the  court  !  But  Lord  Manners  and  his 
tenets  had  passed  away,  and  Mr.  Bellew's  epitaph  may  state 
that  he  too,  in  his  generation,  was  one  of  his  Majesty's  counsel- 
at-law. 

My  eye,  turning  from  Mr.  Belle w,  soon  rested  upon  several 
other  barristers  of  his  creed,  who,  like  him,  had  been  taking 
the  benefit  of  the  statute.  Among  them,  and  apparently  the 
youngest  of  the  group,  was  Mr.  O'Loghlin,  upon  whom  Emanci- 
pation had  fortunately  come  just  at  a  period  of  his  crreer 
when  promotion,  being  possible,  was  inevitable.  He  is  already 
one  of  the  three  sergeants,  and,  if  the  orisons  of  the  public  can 
confer  length  of  days,  the  highest  judicial  office  is  his  certain 
destination. 

But  the  most  singular  of  those  metamorphoses,  which,  viien 
I  last  addressed  you, it  would  have  been  maniacal  to  have  pre- 
dicted, was  exhibited  in  the  personal  identity  and  present  offi- 
cial attributes  of  the  worthy  ex-Secretary  of  the  ex-Catholic 
Association,  Mr.  Nicholas  Purcel  O'Gorman.  This  excellent 
and  best-tempered  of  organized  beings,  who,  during  a  life  de- 
voted to  the  angry  politics  of  Ireland,  has  made  as  many  fr.'onds 
as  another  would  have  created  enemies  —  who  was  e-  s,v  frank 
and  fearless  in  the  expression  of  his  opinions,  even  though  one 
of  those  opinions  was  and  is  that  "  St.  Paul  was  a  decided 
Orangeman"  —  now  stood  before  me,  transformed  into  nothing 
less  than  a  public  functionary,  by  title  Oursitor,  of  that  very 
court  in  which  Mr.  Saurin  had  pleaded  and  Lord  Manners  had 
presided.  The  selection,  I  am  bound  to  add,  has  been  pro- 
nounced by  the  public,  from  whose  discernment  in  such  mat- 
ters there  is  no  appeal,  to  have  been  worthy  of  the  exalted 
person  to  whom,  fortunately  for  Ireland,  higher  functions  thar 
the  extension  of  mere  acts  of  considerateness  toward  meritori 
©us  individuals  have  been  again  committed. 

I  approached  the  group,  to  whom  Mr.  O'Gorman,  who  ha  J 
been  recently  sworn  in,  was  detailing  with  humorous  exagger- 
ation the  weighty  responsibilities  that  had  descended  upon  his 
rather  Atlantean  shoulders.  The  Cursitor's  office,  I  collected 
/row  him.  was  one  of  the  great  fountain-heads  of  justice,  whence 


356  STATE   OF   PARTIES    IN    DUBLIN. 

litigation  flowed  in  streams  or  torrents  through  the  land.  It 
was  emphatically  the  officina  brevium,  the  inner  temple  of  ori- 
ginal writs,  and  the  Cursitor  the  high-priest,  without  whose 
signature,  now  written  with  majestic  brevity,  "  O'Gorman," 
those  sacred  documents  wrould.  want  their  legal  potency.  J 
was  gratified,  however,  to  hear  Mr.  O'Gorman  add,  which  he 
did  with  a  glance  of  no  doubtful  meaning  at  one  of  his  audi- 
tors, who  had  been  an  unsuccessful  expectant  under  the  old 
regime,  that  his  hierarchal  cares  were  in  some  measure  soothed 
by  sundry  daily  and  not  unwelcome  offerings  from  the  devo- 
tees at  the  shrine  over  which  he  had  been  appointed  to  pre- 
side. It  was  an  office  of  trust  coupled  with  emolument,  a  co- 
incidence which  Mr.  O'Gorman,  though  a  stanch  reformer,  very 
justly  pronounced  to  be  not  incongruous. 

These  are  single  instances  of  the  changes  which  the  surface 
presented,  but  I  could  multiply  them  without  number;  wher- 
ever I  looked  around,  I  found  abundant  evidences,  had  I  other- 
wise been  unaware  of  the  fact,  that  the  genius  of  Mr.  Gregory,* 
no  longer  presided  in  the  government  of  Ireland.  Religious 
peace,  and  never  was  a  peace  more  just  and  necessary,  had 
been  proclaimed  ;  and,  after  it,  had  followed  in  due  course  the 
gradual  decline  of  as  hateful  a  faction  as  had  ever  desolated 
and  insulted  a  devoted  country.  There  was,  however,  no  want 
of  excitement.  It  had  changed  its  character,  but  was  as  active 
in  its  way  as  in  those  dreary  times  when  Mr.  Lefroy's  theology 
and  Master  Ellis's  statesmanship  found  favor  at  the  Castle. 
The  groups  of  animated  bustlers  in  the  Hall  were  no  longer 
discussing  the  divided  allegiance  of  the  Catholics,  or  holding 
a  drum  head  inquiry  over  Mr.  Shell's  last  speech  at  the  Asso- 
ciation, but  much  was  said  of  schedule  A —  of  its  multiform 
abominations  by  the  smaller  and  more  hopeless  politicians  — 
of  its  wisdom  and  necessity  by  others,  and  among  them  not  a 
few  who  conceived  it  to  be  both  wise  and  necessary  to  declare 
their  opinions  in  favor  of  reform.     But  I  soon  discovered  that 

*  Of  William  Gregory  (who  was  Privy  Councillor  and  Under-Secretary  fJ" 
Ireland)  mention  has  already  been  made  in  one  of  the  notes  on  Lo'il  Norbnrx, 
page  36,  in  this  volume.      Mr.  Gregory  was  a  "  Protestant  Ascendency"   .1  »r 
His  3on  represented  Dublin,  in  Parliament,  for  a  time. —  M. 


TFtft   CANDIDATES.  35? 

the  buzz  around  me  tinned  upon  a  matter  of  a  still  more  imme- 
diate interest;  an  active  canvass  was  going  forward.  The 
Dublin  election  waa  fixed  for  the  folbwing  day  ;  and  the  pop- 
ular party,  in  perfect  accordance  upon  this  occasion  with  the 
wishes  of  the  Government,  had  determined  upon  attempting  a 
decisive  blow.  Committees  had  been  sitting;  subscription-lists 
opened  ;  Mr.  William  Murphy  sent  for;  an  earnest  but  amica- 
ble conflict  of  opinion  had  ensued  :  Mr.  Murphy,  with  the  cau- 
tion of  long  experience,  was  strenuous  in  his  advice  that  they 
should  run  no  risks,  but,  by  concentrating  their  forces,  secure 
the  return  of  one  member.  " Delenda  est  Carthago"  was  the 
cry  of  Sergeant  O'Loghlin  and  Mr.  Blake,  and  the  bolder 
counsel  had  prevailed  :  two  reform  candidates  had  been  started 
against  the  corporation  of  Dublin. 

The  competitors  upon  this  stirring  occasion  were  the  late 
members,  Messrs.  Moore  and  Shaw,  who  rested  their  preten- 
sions on  their  love  of  corporations,  and  their  hatred  of  reform; 
Mr.  (now  Sir  Robert)  Harty,*  the  Lord-Mayor  of  Dublin,  and 
Mr.  Louis  Perrin,  an  eminent  member  of  the  Irish  bar.  The 
two  latter  announced  themselves  as  sturdy  reformers. 

Of  Mr.  George  Moore  I  can  not  tell  you  much,  for  I  only 
know  of  him  what  the  public  knows.f  He  is,  I  should  sup- 
pose, between  fifty  and  sixty  years  of  age.  There  is  nothing 
remarkable  in  his  face  or  person.  He  is  a  man  of  mild  man- 
ners and  violent  opinions;  can  make  a  long  speech  on  most 
subjects,  either  in  or  out  of  Parliament ;  is  the  proprietor  of  an 
ample  sinecure  in  one  of  our  courts;  and  much  regarded  by 
his  personal  acquaintances.  The  only  singular  events  in  the 
history  of  his  life  that  I  have  heard  recorded  were,  his  first 
return  for  the  city  of  Dublin,  and  an  incident  connected  with 
it.  The  day  preceding  that  fixed  for  the  election  had  closed;, 
and  the  corporation,  still  in  search  of  a  fit  and  proper  nominee, 

*  Sir  Robert  Harly,  who  was  made  a  Baronet  in  September,  1331,  was  a 
libera"  in  politics.  He  was  an  Alderman  of  the  old  Dublin  Corporation,  ami 
was  Lord-Mayor  in  1830— 'J .  Though  he  and  Mr.  Perrin  were  elected,  as  sta- 
led ny  Mr.  Sheil,  their  triumph  was  shoi-t-lived,  for  they  were  unseated  on  pe- 
tition.—  M. 

t  Mr.  Gfeoirje  Dgle  Moore,  who  was  M.  P.  for  Dublin,  for  a  short  time,  wag 
one  of  the  most  undistinguished  men  in  Parliament. —  M. 


358  STATK   <tt    PARTIES   IN    bDBLTlT. 

continued  their  deliberations  through  the  nij>;ht..  Mr.  ^ioore1, 
as  yet  un thought  of,  retired  at  his  accustomed  hour  to  repose. 
At  midnight,  as  the  story  goes,  he  was  suddenly  awakened, 
and  saw  at  his  bedside  the  portly  form  of  Master  Ellis,  deputed 
from  the  still-sitting  committee,  to  know  if  he  would  consent  to 
be  returned  to  Parliament  from  his  native  city.  Mr.  Moore 
rubbed  his  eyes,  pressed  the  Master's  hand  more  closely,  to  as- 
certain that  it  was  a  hand  of  flesh  and  blood  ;  saw  visions  of  Par- 
liamentary renown  start  up  befo;e  him,  and  thinking  that  nuio 
he  surely  could  not  be  dreaming,  gave  his  assent.  The  next 
day  he  was  the  member  for  Dublin:  the  "Mirror  of  Parlia- 
ment" tells  the  rest. 

Mr.  Frederick  Shaw  is  a  much  younger  man  than  Mr.  Moore. 
He  Avas  called  to  the  bar  in  the  year  1822,  and  for  the  first 
five  years  gave  no  signs  of  his  subsequent  prosperity.*  He 
was  assiduous,  but  in  no  way  distinguished.  The  first  occa- 
sion upon  which  the  courts  became  familiar  with  his  name  was 
in  1827,  upon  the  arrival  of  Sir  Anthony  Hart  as  the  Lord 
Chancellor  of  Ireland.  Sir  William  M'Mahon,  the  Master  of 
the  Rolls,  conceived  that  in  him  was  vested  the  power  of  ap- 
pointing a  particular  officer  of  his  own  court.  Former  Chan- 
cellors, however,  had  claimed  and  exercised  the  right  of  ap- 
pointment, and  Sir  Anthony  Hart  announced  that  he  would 
follow  their  example.  The  Master  of  the  Rolls,  desirous  that 
the  question  should  undergo  a  solemn  discussion  and  adjudica- 
tion, nominated  his  relative,  Mr.  Shaw,  to  the  office  in  dispute. 
Mr.  Shaw  presented  a  petition  to  the  lord-Chancellor,  praying 
to  be  admitted  to  the  performance  of  the  duties,  and  the  per- 
ception of  the  profits,  and  Mr.  Saurin  appeared  as  the  leading 
counsel  in  support  of  the  claim. 

The  matter,  in  itself,  was  one  of  no  sort  of  public  interest: 
it  was  a  mere  question  of  patronage  between  two  judicial  dig- 

*  Frederick  Shaw,  whose  early  appointment  to  the  Recordership  of  Dublir 
excited  much  discussion  at  the  time,  probably  owed  his  preferment  to  the  fact 
that  his  aunt  was  wile  of  the  late  Sir  William  M'Mahon,  then  Master  of  the 
Rolls  in  Ireland.  Mr.  Shaw,  where  politics  did  not  bias  him#  gave  satLfnc'ioo 
as  a  judge.  He  was  a  Privy  Councillor  and  repress  >'ed  the  University  of  Dub- 
lin in  several  Parliaments. —  M. 


liitaries  ;  yet  wondrous  was  the  interest,  or  at  least  the  curios- 
ity, with  which  the  proceedings  were  watched,  and  the  result 
conjectured.  Tt  had  the  novelty  of  being  the  first  case  in  any 
way  peculiar,  and  that  one  relating  to  himself  individually, 
upon  which  the  newly-imported  Chancellor  was  to  be  called 
upon  to  decide.  It  was  expected  by  sundry  shrewd  solicitors 
that  litigation,  even  between  two  such  high  contending  parties 
would  produce  the  usual  feelings  of  personal  estrangement,  and. 
as  a  profitable  result,  that  appeals  from  the  Rolls  to  the  Chan- 
cellor would  not  fail  to  be  multiplied  ;  while  others,  who  had 
been  often  made  to  smart  under  Sir  William's  inexorable  rules 
and  orders,  were  delighted  to  find  that  his  Honor  for  once  had 
a  prospect  of  feeling  in  his  own  purse  what  it  was  to  have  the 
prayer  of  a  petition  refused  with  costs. 

These  were  the  effusions  of  the  mere  idle  gossip  of  the  Hall, 
and  excited  nothing  but  amusement;  but  pending  the  discus- 
sion, an  incident  occurred  which  sent  a  profounder  feeling 
through  the  courts  and  the  country.  In  the  course  of  his  ar- 
gument, Mr.  Saurin,  for  the  moment  oblivious  of  the  recent 
change  of  Chancellors,  implored  of  the  Court  to  recollect 
the  seditious  spirit  that  was  abroad,  and  the  factious  disposi- 
tion daily  manifested  to  bring  even  the  highest  public  func- 
tionaries into  contempt  —  a  disposition  which  "  the  continuance 
of  the  present  litigation  would  not  fail  to  foster  and  gratify.'' 
This  Avas  a  topic  to  which  Lord  Manners  would  have  listened 
with  all  the  nervous  attention  of  a  weak  mind  overawed  by 
the  horrors  of  a  phantom-story.  The  healthier  intellect  of  Sir 
Anthony  saw  in  it  nothing  but  its  inappropriateness.  He  in- 
terposed, saying:  "If  tliP'.e  be  any  spirit  abroad  which  would 
lead  persons  to  degrade  the  higher  authorities  of  the  country, 
my  opinion  is,  that  that  spirit  can  only  be  met  and  counteract- 
ed by  those  who  hold  such  high  situations  having  their  motives 
and  their  actions  exposed  to  the  fullest  public  scrutiny.  When 
these  motives  and  that  conduct  are  properly  placed  before  the 
world,  they  may  be  satisfied  that  both  will  be  rightly  appreci- 
ated by  the  public:  and  so  much,  Mr.  Saurin,  for  that  topic." 
The  effect  of  these  few  simple  words  in  the  Irish  Court  of  Chan- 
.•jry  was  electrical.     Mr.  Saurin  was  disconcerted;  his  Bruue- 


'  -*^i 


$66  STATE    OF    PARTIES    IN    DUBLIN. 

wick  friends  beside  him  panic-struck;  Sergeant,  Lefroy  looked 
first  up  to  heaven,  and  then  full  in  the  face  of  his  valued  friend 
Mr.  Henchy  ;  Mr.  Henchy  responded  with  a  look  at  once  his- 
torical and  prophetic;  a  buzz  of  perturbation  passed  along  the 
benches  of  the  outer  bar;  while  Mr.  Eccles  Cuthbert  (almost 
the  sole  surviving  Whig  of  the  olden  time)  rushed  forth  from 
the  Court  toward  the  Hall,  and,  standing  at  the  top  of  the 
Chancery-steps,  proclaimed  to  a  group  that  he  beckoned  round 
him  the  joyful  tidings  that  "  if  he"  (Mr.  Cuthbert)  "  could  in- 
terpret the  signs  of  the  times  —  and  he  thought  he  could  —  the 
influence  of  Saurin  and  his  party  was  gone  for  ever/' 

But,  to  return  to  Mr.  Shaw  —  the  decision  of  the  Chancellor 
was  against  him,  but  he  was  quickly  consoled  for  the  disap- 
pointment. The  RecordersliTD  of  Dublin  becoming  vacant,  he 
had  the  good  fortune  to  be  ele-'*ed  to  the  office.  The  public- 
were  at  first  dissatisfied -with  the  selection  —  chiefly,  however, 
because  it  had  fallen  upon  so  juvenile  a  person  ;  but  it  is  only 
justice  to  Mr.  Shaw  to  state  that  he  has  proved  himself  per- 
fectly competent  to  the  discharge  of  the  judicial  functions  that 
were  thus  rather  prematurely  cast  upon  him.  As  the  Recorder 
of  Dublin,  he  is  an  assiduous  and  excellent  public  officer.  I 
would  further  say  that  this  is  the  very  office  for  which  he  is 
peculiarly  adapted.  He  performs  the  substantial  duties  effi- 
ciently, and  wants  not  she  leading  ornamental  requisites  for 
those  matters  of  municipal  ceremony  in  which  he  is  called 
upon,  virtute  officii,  to  bear  a  prominent  part.  His  aspect  may 
still  be  over-youthful;  in  fact,  when  he  appears  at  a  civic  fes- 
tival attired  in  his  legal  costume,  his  smooth  and  pallid  face 
and  rather  feminine  features  present  a  strong  similitude  to 
Portia  in  the  scene  where  she  holds  a  brief  against  Shylock; 
but  ample  compensation  for  this  deficiency  (if  it  be  one)  is 
made  in  the  proportions  of  his  frame,  which  possess  all  the 
necessary  corporate  massiveness  and  rotundity  for  the  scenic 
business  of  a  Lord  Mayor's  day.  I  have  seen  him  perform  on 
such  occasions  with  much  effect,  and  with  the  bearing  of  ar 
actor  that  liked  his  part.  As  the  Recorder  of  an  ancient  and 
loyal  corporation,  Mr.  Frederick  Shaw  is  just  where  he  ougl' 
to  be.     He  has  no  -jnseemly  contempt  for  pageantry;  and,  fo? 


LOtJlS    PERRtft.  361 

city  purposes,  is  a  most  discreet  and  emphatic  orator.  He  can 
descant,  with  suitable  amplitude  of  phrase,  upon  the  sanctity 
of  chartered  rights,  and  can  deliver  the  prescriptive  lecture  to  an 
incoming  Lord-Mayor,  upon  his  civic  responsibilities,  in  terms 
of  the  most  stately  and  appropriate  commonplace.  To  such 
duties  he  is  equal,  and  not  above  them.  —  I  pass  on  to  the  other 
candidates. 

Sir  Robert  Harty  is  a  citizen  of  Dublin,  who  has  risen  by 
his  industry  to  considerable  affluence.  In  the  corporation,  of 
which  he  has  long  been  one  of  the  most  influential  members, 
he  has  been  noted  for  his  attachment  to  liberal  principles.  He 
is  the  brother-in-law  of  Alderman  M'Kenny,  who  in  his  year 
of  mayoralty  (1819)  had  the  courage  to  convene  a  general 
meeting  of  the  Protestants  of  Dublin,  to  petition  in  favor  of 
Catholic  Emancipation.  Sir  Robert  Harty 's  civic  career  has 
been  marked  by  an  official  act  —  less  conspicuous,  it  is  true, 
but  of  similar  boldness.  When  the  Roman  Catholic  delegates 
were  prosecuted  by  the  Government  in  1812,  he  was  one  of  the 
Sheriffs  of  Dublin,  and  empanelled  an  impartial  jury  for  their 
trial.  This  gave  great  offence,  and  both  in  and  out  of  the  cor- 
poration the  honest  Sheriff  had  much  to  endure  for  having 
done  his  duty  ;  but  he  has  fortunately  lived  to  find  that  sen- 
tence of  condemnation  in  those  times  now  forms  one  of  his  most 
valid  titles  to  public  confidence.  So  g^eat  was  the  imagined 
strength  of  the  corporation  of  Dublin,  that  for  some  days  Sir 
Robert  Harty  was  the  solitary  candidate  upon  reform  princi- 
ples. More  than  one  of  the  commercial  body  of  Dublin,  though 
strongly  urged  by  the  popular  party  to  become  his  colleague 
had  declined.  The  bar  was  then  resorted  to.  A  union  of  the 
most  important  qualifications  was  found  in  Mr.  Perrin,  who. 
after  repeated  solicitations,  consented  to  give  the  public  the 
use  of  his  name  and  character  for  the  advancement  of  the  great 
imperial  measure. 

Mr.  Perrin  was  called  to  the  bar  in  1806.  There  was  noth- 
ing sudden  or  brilliant  in  his  ascent  to  professional  distinction. 
He  was  patient  and  persevering;  and  in  his  deportment, 
whether  in  or  out  of  court,  simple  and  unobtrusive.  Even  af- 
ter the  extension  of  his  character  for  learning  and  ability  had 

Vol.  II.— 16 


3(32  STATE   OK    PAllTlES    IN   DOBLltf. 

brought  him  into  full  practice,  there  was  so  little  forensic  (lis 
play  in  his  manner — what  he  said  upon  each  occasion  was 
always  so  much  to  the  purpose,  and  consequently  so  short  and 
direct  —  that  a  stranger  to  his  professional  repute  would  have 
principally  inferred,  from  the  frequency  of  his  appearances  in 
court,  that  he  was  already  high  among  the  most  eminent  coun 
lei  of  his  day.* 

Mr.  Perrin  is,  I  believe,  universally  admitted  to  he  the  best 
common-law  lawyer  of  the  Irish  bar.  It  is  probably  to  be  at- 
tributed in  some  degree  to  early  accidents  that  his  studies  and 
practice  should  have  been  exclusively  confined  to  this  depart- 
ment; but  I  apprehend  that  an  original  peculiarity  of  his  mind 
had  also  much  to  do  in  keeping  him  out  of  the  courts  of  equity. 
I  have  heard  it  related  of  him  that,  from  the  commencement 
of  his  legal  studies,  he  felt  a  deep  and  unconquerable  distaste 
to  equity -pleading  —  to  that  system  under  which,  as  a  matter 
of  ordinary  routine,  fifty  false  charges  may  be  made  against  a 
miserable  defendant  on  the  chance  of  eliciting  a  single  truth, 
and  under  which  the  same  defendant,  if  knavishly  disposed, 
and  aided  by  a  dexterous  pleader,  may  resort  to  as  many  de- 
vices to  evade  a  direct  and  intelligible  reply.  I  can  easily 
conceive  that  a  mind  like  Mr.  Perrin's,  always  seeking  accu- 
racy of  thought  and  brevity  of  expression,  should  have  turned 
with  disgust  from  the  farrago  of  long-winded  fictions,  and  end- 
less repetitions,  and  wordy  superfluities,  which  form  the  staple 
of  Chancery  pleadings ;  but  whatever  the  motive,  he  has. 
almost  from  the  outset  of  his  career,  confined  himself  to  the 
cemmon-law  courts;  among  them  the  King's  Bench  has  been 
the  principal  theatre  of  his  exertions.  Assiduous  application 
and  long  experience  have  rendered  him  familiar  with  all  the 
great  branches  of  the  law  that  are  brought  into  discussion  be- 
fore that  tribunal ;  and,  to  an  intimate  knowledge  of  his  subject, 
he  unites  logical  powers  of  the  highest  order.  His  diction, 
though  clear  and  vigorous,  is  not  always  fluent;  but  the  occa- 

*  Louis  Perrin,  one  of  the  most  able  and  honest  of  the  Irish  bar,  was  promo- 
ted, in  due  course,  when  the  Liberal  party  were  in  power,  and  is  now  (January, 
1854)  third  judge  of  the  Court  of  Queen's  Bench,  Ireland.  In  Parliament  ne 
was  a  useful  and  laborious,  rather  than  an  oratorical  member. —  M. 


LOUIS   PERRIN.  36S 

sional  tardiness  of  phrase  to  which  I  allude,  and  which  detracts 
little  from  the  force  or  effect  of  his  reasonings,  appears  to  be 
very  much  the  result  of  acquired  habits  of  mastery  over  the 
most  important  operations  of  his  mind.  If  he  sometimes  pauses 
for  a  moment,  it  is  not  that  he  is  in  want  of  matter  or  of  words, 
but  that  he  is  determined  and  able  to  retain  and  exercise  a 
control  over  both  ;  it  is  that,  even  while  his  mind  is  hurrying 
along  a  rapid  cha'ii  of  reasoning,  he  still  preserves  the  power 
of  arresting  a  thought  in  its  progress  from  conception  to  expres- 
sion, and  of  ascertaining  its  fitness  for  his  purpose  before  he 
allows  it  irrevocably  to  pass  his  lips  ;  and  the  result  of  the  en- 
forcement of  this  inward  dicaipline  is,  that,  though  his  language 
may  be  rendered  less  continuous,  his  argument  is  sure  of  being 
better  for  the  delay.  If  Mr.  Perrin  could  consent  to  be  a  less 
cautious  and  accurate  reasoner,  he  would,  I  am  satisfied,  be- 
come at  once  a  more  fluent  speaker ;  but  he  reasons  everything, 
abhorring  all  flashy  declamation,  and  guided  by  a  special  in- 
stinct against  the  use  of  words  for  talking-sake. 

Having  thus  shortly  referred  to  Mr.  Perrin's  professional 
qualifications,  I  need  hardly  add  that  he  has  for  many  years 
commanded  the  leading  business  of  the  Court  of  King's  Bench. 
Among  the  cases  constantly  occurring  on  the  criminal  side  of 
that  court,  there  is  one  class  in  which  he  appears  to  have  estab- 
lished a  sort  of  personal  property  (for  he  is  never  omitted) :  I 
allude  to  appeals  from  convictions  by  magistrates  under  penal 
statutes,  particularly  those  relating  to  the  customs  and  excise. 
In  such  cases  the  offending  party  has  usually  a  twofold  chance 
of  escape  —  in  the  blunders  of  the  legislator,  and  in  those  of 
the  convicting  magistrates.  The  leaning  of  the  court  is  always 
to  uphold  such  convictions;  but  Mr.  Perrin,  with  his  sagacity, 
and  pertinacious  logic,  and  adroit  application  of  authorities 
that  bear,  or  appear  to  bear,  upon  the  point,  seldom  fails  to 
demonstrate  to  the  full  satisfaction  of  every  mind  in  court  (ex 
cept  perhaps  his  own)  that  something,  in  substance  or  in  form, 
has  been  wanting  to  legalize  the  proceedings  from  which  his 
clients  have  appealed. 

The  subject-matter  of  such  discussions  is  in  general  devoid 
of  popular  interest  \  but  they  sometimes  acquire  from  incidental 


364  STATE    OF    PARTIES    IN    DUBLIN 

circumstances  no  small  degree  of  scenic  effect.  I  remember, 
for  instance,  to  have  seen  some  years  since  one  of  the  side- 
galleries  of  the  Court  of  King's  Bench  occupied  by  an  entire 
ship's  crew  of  Dutch  smugglers,  brought  up,  under  writs  of 
habeas  corpus,  from  one  of  the  prisons  on  the  southern  coast  of 
Ireland  ;  and  while  Mr.  Perrin,  as  their  counsel,  was  moving 
;hat  they  should  be  discharged  from  illegal  custody,  and  pres- 
sing the  court  with  arguments  and  cases,  it  was  curious  to  ob- 
serve his  weather-beaten  clients,  with  their  bluff  figures  and 
contraband  visages,  how  intently  they  looked  on  as  their  fate 
was  debated  in  (to  them)  an  unknown  tongue,  and  with  what 
a  singular  promptness  they  appeared  to  discover,  from  mere 
external  signs  —  from  the  looks  and  gestures  of  the  Judges  or 
the  auditors  —  that  their  counsel  was  making  way  with  the 
court.  Their  deliverance,  I  recollect,  was  effected  ;  and  if  they 
and  the  hundreds  of  others  of  their  trade  and  country,  whom 
Mr.  Perrin  has  similarly  rescued  from  an  Irish  prison,  have  any 
gratitude,  his  must  be  a  well-known  and  popular  name  in  the 
Dutch  ports. 

Mr.  Perrin's  professional  eminence  was  not  his  sole  ground 
of  claim  to  the  honor  of  representing  the  city  of  Dublin  in  Par- 
liament :  he  had  a  further  and  stronger  recommendation  to 
the  public  confidence  in  the  vigor  and  integrity  of  his  personal 
character.  The  political  principles  which  he  avows  have  now, 
in  the  circle  of  events,  become  the  reigning  doctrine  of  the  day, 
and  the  merit  may  be  small  of  professing  such  principles  at  the 
present  moment.  Mr.  Perrin's  praise  is,  that  what  he  now  is, 
he  has  always  been ;  that  under  circumstances  the  most  ad- 
verse to  professional  advancement,  he  entered  into  no  compro- 
mise between  his  interests  and  opinions,  but  in  every  stage  of 
his  progress  asserted  himself  and  the  dignity  of  his  profession 
by  an  erect  and  independent  bearing ;  he  did  so  in  a  temper 
and  spirit  the  most  remote  from  faction,  but  he  met  with  little 
mercy.  He  had  incurred  the  virtue  of  public  spirit,  and  was 
marked  for  discouragement  —  even  the  poor  distinction  of  a 
silk-gown  was  delayed  until  Lord  Manners's  last  general  levee 
of  King's  counsel;  and  even  then  it  was  understood  that  Mr. 
Perrin  would  have  been  designedly  omitted,  had  not  the  Lord 


POPULAR   TRIUMPH.  365 

'Chief- Justice,  to  whose  better  spirit  what  is  just  and  manly 
is  always  familiar,  peremptorily  interposed  his  authority,  as  the 
head  of  the  common-law  bar,  against  an  act  of  such  unworthy- 
partisanship. 

I  fear  that  I  am  trespassing  on  the  ground  of  the  "  Sketches 
of  the  Irish  Ear  ;"  but,  as  I  have  gone  so  far,*  let  me  say  a 
word  of  Mr.  Perriirs  personal  appearance.  It  is  not  so  re- 
mark-able  as  to  attract  examination;  but  when  you  examine  it, 
yon  find  its  unostentatious  simplicity  to  be  strikingly  accord- 
ant with  his  mind  and  character.  His  figure  is  about  the  mid- 
dle size,  and  slightly  approaching  to  corpulence.  He  has  black 
hair,  a  dark  complexion,  and  regular  Roman  features.  Though 
no  one  has  a  quicker  perception  of  mirth,  or  enjoys  it  more 
heartily,  the  habitual  expression  of  his  countenance  is  gra ve- 
il ess,  even  perhaps  to  a  touch  of  sadness;   the  latter,  however, 

*  Mr.  Pcrrin  was  worthy  of  a  distinct  place  in  these  "  Sketches,"  for  few 
lawyers  haH  so  much  to  contend  with,  on  account  of  particular  family  circum- 
stances (of  no  interest  to  the  public),  which,  for  a  time  clouded  his  prospects. 
The  touch  of  sadness  upon  his  countenance  was  caused,  I  doubt  not,  by  the  mis- 
conduct  of  a  near  relative,  which  met  with  exemplary  punishment  from  the  law. 
Ine  Irish  attorneys,  among  whom  this  person  had  once  been  enrolled,  considered 
it  hard  that  an  innocent  man  should  suffer,  from  a  sort  of  reflected  cloud,  and 
generously  showed  their  sympathy,  by  throwing  as  much  business  into  Mr. 
Perriu?s  hands  as  they  safely  could.  In  a  short  time,  proving  equal  to  the  labor, 
his  great  ability  obtained,  as  a  right,  that  practice  which,  at  first  had  been  con- 
ceded as  a  favor.  In  customs  and  excise  cases,  he  was  unapproached,  almost  from 
the  first. — As  I  am  on  a  legal  question,  and  have  arrived  at  the  close  of  this 
work,  let  me  add,  in  reference  to  the  conviction  of  John  Scanlan,  at  Limerick, 
in  1820,  for  murder  on  the  Shannon  (as  detailed  in  the  sketch  called  "  An  Irish 
Circuit,"  in  the  first  volume),  that  Mr.  Sheil  treating  of  the  facts,  and  Gerald 
Griffin,  working  them  up  into  romantic  fiction,  strangely  omitted  two  strong 
points.  The  first,  as  to  motive.  Sullivan  confessed  to  Scanlan's  desire  to 
get  rid,  by  murder,  of  the  poor  young  creature  whom  he  had  seduced  (by  mock 
marriage),  "  because  she  kept  calling  him  her  husband."  The  second,  show- 
ing the  malice  prepense,  was  that  the  crime  was  delayed  until  Scanlan  had  pur- 
chased a  boat,  in  which  the  victim  was  to  be  earned  out  of  sight  of  land,  and 
ihere  "  done  to  death,"  and  until  a  blacksmith  had  made  a  chain  and  collar  to 
tie  round  her  neck,  attached  to  a  heavy  stone,  to  sink  the  body.  I  have  read 
the  report  of  the  trial,  since  I  annotated  Mr.  Sheil's  detail  of  facts,  but  only  in 
time  to  put  the  statement  into  this  place. —  At  this  last  moment,  too,  I  perceive 
that  the  Marchioness  Wellesley  (the  heroine  of  the  Dublin  Tabinet  Ball,  Vol.  I.) 
died  at  Hampton  Court  Palace,  near  London,  on  December  17,  1853. —  M. 


366  STATE    OF   PARTIES   IN   DUBLIN. 

I  apprehend  to  be  nothing  more  than  the  mere  trace  of  the 
laborious  occupations  in  which  his  life  has  been  passed.  On 
the  whole,  I  would  say  of  his  exterior,  including  face,  and 
form,  and  apparel,  that  it  was  individualized  by  a  certain  re- 
publican homeliness,  intimating  a  natural,  careless  manliness 
of  taste,  and  not  without  its  peculiar  dignity. 

I  intended,  when  I  sat  down,  to  have  entered  upon  some  of 
the  details  of  the  Dublin  election  and  its  sequel ;  but  the  sub- 
ject, I  find,  would  carry  me  too  far:  let  me  therefore  for  the 
present  merely  say  that,  after  an  obstinate  struggle,  the  corpo- 
ration, that  cumbrous  excrescence  upon  our  institutions,  was 
fairly  prostrated,  and  the  popular  candidates  returned.  The 
triumph  was  celebrated  with  all  due  rites  and  solemnities.  I 
witnessed  the  chairing  from  a  window  in  Grafton  street.  The 
sun  shone  brightly  on  the  procession  as  it  passed  —  but  not 
more  brightly  than  the  countenance  of  our  venerable  and  pa- 
triotic veteran,  Mr.  Peter  Burrowes,  who  had  taken  his  station 
at  an  opposite  balcony,  and  looked  down  (as  his  friend  Louis 
Perrin  was  wafted  along)  with  a  smile  of  joyous  and  ineffable 
thanksgiving,  that  he  had  been  spared  to  see  that  day. 


INDEX. 


Abduction,  Trials  for,  i.,  42 

Abercrombie,  James,  Speaker  of  the 
Commons,  ii.,  207  ;  Sineeurist,  Peer, 
and  Pensioner,  225 

Abinger,  Lord  (See  Sir  James  Scar- 
lett). 

Acres,  The  Fifteen,  ii.,  166 

Adelaide,  Queen,  and  the  Melbourne 
Ministry,  ii.,  209 

Affidavit,  Oratory  of  the,  i.,  72 

Agrarian  Disturbances,  Causes  of,  ii., 
71 

"All  Ireland,  Member  for,"  i.,  257 

"All  the  Talents,"  in  Office,  i.,  240; 
can  not  carry  Catholic  Emancipation, 
367 

American  compared  with  English  and 
Irish  Bar,  i.,  272 

American  Marchioness  (Wellesley),  i., 
333;  ii.,  365 

Amherst,  Lord,  bis  Embassy  to  China, 
i.,  183;  ii.,  385 

Anglesey,  Marquis  of,  encourages  Irisli 
Agitation,  i.,  387  ;  Memoir  of,  ii.,  255 

Antidote,  Tbe,  Sir  Harcourt  Lees' Jour- 
nal, i.,  349 

Anti-Tithe  Emeide  in  Limerick,  i.,229 

Appeals,  heard  by  the  Peers,  i.,  175 

Approvers,  Irish,  i.,  23  ;  ii.,  54 

Argyle,  Duke  of,  ii.,  347 

Aristocracy,  Irish  Catholic,  i.,  365  ; 
join  Catholic  Association,  38£ 

Assistant-Barristers,  Duties  of,  i.,  67  ; 
as  County  Judges,  ii.,  100 

Assizes,  at  Limerick,  i.,  151  ;  at  Wex- 
ford, i.,  287  ;  at  Clonmel,  ii.,  14 

Associations,  Catholic,  their  History, 
i.,  359 

Attorney  and  Barrister,  different  Status 
of,  i.,  28 

Attorneys,  how  admitted  to  the  Bar, 
j.,  ?9 


Author's  Introduction.,  i.,  IT 

Avocat,  a  French,  i.,  195 

Avonmore,  Lord  (  Barry  Yelvertoa),  No- 
tice of,  i.,  25  ;  Friendship  for  Cumin, 
303 

Ball,  the  Dublin  Tabinet.  i.,  328 

Bar,  Calamities  of  the,  i.,  186 

Costume  in  Ireland,  ii.,  IT? 

Catholics  excluded  horn  t'..  3    i.  ,90 

License  of  the,  i.,  277 

American  compared  with  tin:  Eng- 
lish and  Irish,  i.,  272 

Catholic,  ii.,  75 

French,  i.,  194 

Irish,   i.,   62  ;    Qualifications    for 


65 ;  Discipline  for,  66  ;  Inoevciiuer.ee 
of,  68 

Precedence  at  the,  ii.,  98  \  Train 


ing  for  the,  156 
Bar-Mess,  Mock  Trials  before,  i.,  27 
Bar  Travelling,  Etiquette  of,  i.,  21 
Barrington,    Sir  Jonah,   Notice    of,   i. 

247  ;  at  Dublin  Election,  270  ;  Scene 

with  Lord  Norbury,  ii.,  7 
Barrister  and  Attorney,  different  Status 

of,  i.,  28 
Barrister,Confessions  of  a  Junior,  ii., 154 
Barristers,  Irish,  Term  Dinners  in  Lon- 
don, ii.,  156 
Barry,  Sir  Charles,  Architect,  i.,  254 
Beaconsfield,  Goold's  Visit  to,  i.,  242 
Beauty,  Irish,  at  Tabinet  Ball,  i.,  331 
Bedford,  Duke  of,  Irish  Viceroy,  i.,  159 
Bell,  Jocky,  Notice  of,  ii.,  350 
Bellamy's,  i.,  158;   Scene  at,  ii.,  251 
Bellew,  Sir  Edward,  ii.,  92 
Bellow,  William,  Catholic  Barrister,  ii., 

92;  Admission,  93;  Demeanor,  94; 

extensive  Practice,  96  ;  Pension.  9S  ; 

Religious   Profession    and    Practice, 

104 ;  Scene  in  the  Rolls  Court  wich, 

105 ;  Promotion,  354 


O'OD 


INDEX. 


Beresfords,  the,  i.,  242 

Best,  Chief-Justice  (Lord  Wynford), 
i.,  278 

Bethel,  Counsellor  '  of  the  Half-Crown,' 
ii.,  113 

Bexley,  Lord,  Notice  of,  ii.,  352 

Bianconi,  Charles,  his  Mode  of  Travel- 
ling, i.,  287 

Bible-Teaching,  O'Connell  on,  i.,  223 

Blackburne,  Lord-Chancellor,  an  Anti- 
Cftholic,  ii  .  120;  his  Demeanor, 
126  ;  his  earlv  ApH-Curran  Manifes- 
tation, 128;  Piugress  at  the  Bur,  122  , 
Sits  as  Judge  under  the  Insurrection 
Act,  130;  his  Promotions,  133 

Blake,  Anthony  Richard,  i.,79  ;  a  Cath- 
olic Privy  Councillor,  ii.,  78 ;  Edu- 
cation Commissioner,  200 

Blarucy-Stone,  the,  i.,  03 

B  oomficld,  Lord,  Notice  of,  i.,  388 

Bolster's  Magazine  of  Ireland,  i.,  12 

3btlle-Riot,  the,  i.,200;  Trial  for,  279 

I*oulter,  Primate,  i.,  300  ;  ii.,  88 

Brady,  Maziere,  Lord-Chancellor  of 
Ireland,  ii.,  134 

Bridge  of  Wexford,  Massacre  on  the, 
i.,  297 

Brinkley,  Bishop,  the  Astronomer,  i., 
330 

Bristol,  Earl  of  (Bishop  of  Derry),  No- 
tice of,  i.,  234 ;  Anecdote  of,  386 

Bristol,  Marquis  of,  ii.,  348 

Bristol,  Reform  Riots  in,  ii.,  210 

Brougham,  Henry,  entraps  Peel,  ii.,  34; 
his  Chancery  Reform,  97  ;  Memoii 
of,  208;  his"  Person,  209;  his  Elo- 
quence, 210;  Reply  to  Peel,  214; 
Dinner  to  Catholic  Deputation,  216  ; 
his  Conversation,  217  ;  his  Levee  as 
Lord-Chancellor,  339 ;  his  Promo- 
tion, 343;  Residence,  Costume,  and 
Visitors,  341 

Brummol!,  and  the  Duke  of  Leinster, 
i.,  344 

Brunswick  Clubs,  ii.,  315 

Ruckland,  Dr.,  Oxford  Professor,  ii., 
341 

Buggins,  Lady  Cecilia  (Duchess  of  In- 
verness), ii.,  219 

Bulls,  Irish  (vide  Sir  Boyle  Roche), 
ii.,  10;    Rationale  of,  11 

Bulwer,  Sir  E.  Lytton,  Satire  on  Sir 
J.  Scarlett,  ii.,  37 

Burdstt,  Sir  Francis,  Notice  of,  ii.,  2  33  ; 
his  Attire,  205 

Burke,  Edmund,  Memoir  of,  i;  238 


Burrowes,  Peter — his  Absence  of  Mind, 
i.,  127  ;  as  an  Advocate,  127  ;  Notice 
of,  ii.,  124 ;  Plunket's  Character  of, 
125 

Burton,  Judge,  Notice  of,  i.,  273 ;  at 
Clonmel  Assizes,  ii.,  137 

Bushe,  Chief-Justice,  Sketch  of, 
i,,  121;  Descent,  122;  Early  Elo- 
quence, 123;  an  Anti-Unionist,  128; 
Promotion,  132;  as  an  Orator,  133; 
Conversation  and  Eloquence,  135 ; 
Brougham's  high  Opinion  of,  143 ; 
his  Wit,  144 

.Memoir  of,  i.,  146;   Elevatian  to 

the  Bench,  149;  redeems  his  Fam- 
ily Estate,  299  ;  at  Wexford  Assizes, 
299 ;  reforms  Abuses  on  Circuit,  302  ; 
pleads  against  Catholic  Committee, 
377  ;   Epigrams  by,  ii.,  213 

Butler,  Charles,  ii.,  91  ;  Memoii  of,  197 

Butler,  Mr.  Augustine,  at  Clare  Elec- 
tion, ii.,  279 

Butler,  Sir  Theobald,  ii.,  79;  Capitu- 
lation and  Treaty  of  Limerick,  80; 
pleads  in  Parliament  against  its  Vio- 
lation, 82  ;  Argument  against  the  Pe- 
nal Code,  83  ;  Death,  Character,  and 
Epitaph,  87 

Byron,  Lady,  ii.,  348 

Byron,  Lord,  Opinion  of  Sheridan,  i., 
138  ;  Monody  on  Sheridan,  139  ;  on 
Reversal  of  Lord  E.  Fitzgerald's  At- 
tainder, 345 ;  on  Royal  Visit,  379  ;  on 
Mrs.  Wilmot  Horton,  ii.,  103  ;  Opin- 
ion of  Curran,  127  ;  on  Lord  Angle- 
sey, 256 

Calamities  of  the  Bar,  i.,186 :  Scene 
in  Chancery,  190;  Life  of  an  Emi- 
nent Lawyer,  190  ;  Henry  MacDou- 
gall,  200 ;  Pomposo,  203  ;  Lord  Avon- 
more  and  the  Monks  of  the  Screw, 
200 ;  Norcott,  the  Renegade,  Storv 
of,  210 

Callaghan,  Daniel  and  Gerald,  ii.,  76 

Callanan,  Jeremiah,  Irish  Poet,  i.,  13 

Calvin,  John,  burns  Servetus,  i.,  167 

Camden,  Lord-Chancellor,  Notice  of, 
i.,  104;  his  Independence,  ii.,  112 

Camden,  Marquis,  a  Model  Sinecurist, 
ii.,  329 

Campbell,  Lord,  Plunket's  bon-mot  up- 
on, i.,  117  ;  his  Irish  Chancellorship, 
119;  as  Chief-Justice,  ii.,  340 

Campbell,  Thomas,  the  Poet,  i.,  12 

Canning,  George,  his  Career,  i.,  322 

Canterbury,  Archbishop  of,  ii.,  344 


INDEX. 


369 


Canterbury,  Viscount  (see  Manners  Sut- 
ton) 
Carding  in  Tipperary,  i.,  71 
Carleton,  Lord  Chief-Justice,  ii.,  19 
Carnarvon,  Earl  of,  ii.,  346 
Caroline,  Queen,  her  Counsel,  i.,  264  ; 
Bribed  Witnesses  at  her  Trial,  ii.,  35 
Carroll,  Father,  of  Wexford,  Trial  of, 

i.,  304 
Castle,  the,  i.,  160 
Castiereagh,  Lord  (Marquis  of  London- 
derry), Notice  of,  i.,  131 ;  how  he 
carried  the  Union,  248 
Catherine,  Queen,  Trial  of,  i.,  91 
Catholic  Aristocracy,  their  Support  of 
the  Union,  ii.,  98 

Association  founded,  i.,  379 

Bar,  ii.,  76  ;  Sir  Theobald  Butler 

and  the  Treaty  of  Limerick,  79  ;  Cath- 
olics excluded  from  the  Bar,  90  ;  ad- 
mitted, 91;  Bellow,  93;  Union  ob- 
tained on  False  Pretences,  98  ;  Scene 
in  Court,  105 

Board,  the,  i.,  133 

-*■ Deputation,  ii.,  192  ;  Visit  to  Dr. 

Milner,  195  ;  arrive  in  London,  202  ; 
attend  Debate  in  House  of  Commons. 
207  ;  Dinner  at  Brougham's,  216  ; 
Public  Meeting  in  London,  220 ;  Din- 
ner at  Norfolk  House,  224 

1 Emancipation,  opjiosed  by  George 

III.,  and  supported  by  his  Ministers, 
i.,  367  ;  carried  by  Wellington,  ii.,  266 

Leaders  and  Associations,  i., 

359;  Penal  Laws,  36  L  ;  Kcogh's  Lead- 
ership, 363;  Denis  Scully,  370;  O'- 
Connell,  372  ;  Royal  Visit,  377  ;  Cath- 
olic Association  founded,  379  ;  sup- 
ported by  the  Catholic  Priesthood 
and  Aristocracy,  381 

Irish,  Existence  of  acknowledged, 

i.,  362 

Magistrates,  ii.,  178 

— —  Meetings,  i.,  281,  and  ii.,  220 

Politics  in  1825,  ii.,  192 

Relief  Bill,  ii.,  302 

Cazales,  Opinion  of  Burke,  i.,  238 
Chadwick,  Mr.,  Murder  of,  ii.,  42 
Chambers,  Sir  William,  i.,  330 
Chancery,  Court  of,  ii.,  96  ;  Delavs  in, 

97 ;   Reform  of  97 
Chantrey,  Sir  Francis,  Sculptor,  i.,  332 ; 
Charlemont,   Earl    of,    brings   Plunket 

into  Irish  Parliament,  i.,  99 
Chesterfield, Earl  oflrish  Viceroy,  ii.,88 
£heyne,  Dr.  John,  Notice  of,  i.,  198 


Chiefs,  on  the  Bench,  i.,  176 
Cliin^,  Embassies  to,  i.,  183 
Circuit  Abuses,  Reform  of,  i..  302 
Circuit,  the,  North  Wales,  i.,  26  ;   Mun 

ster,  35  ;   Leinster,  287 
Circuit,  Mock-Trials  on,  i.,  27 
Circuits,  the  Law,  i.,  19 
Clanricaide,  Marquis  of,  ii.,  352 
Clare  Election,  ii.,  265  ;    Vesey   Fitz 
gerald  opposed,  266  ;  O'Connell  take? 
the    Field,   270;    Nomination,  287; 
Candidates'    Speeches,    289  ;     Inci 
dents  in  the  Election,  295 "   O'Con- 
nell elected,  302 
Clare,   Lord-Chancellor,    Notice  of,  i., 

67  ;  his  Flippancy,  228 
Clerk,  Lord  Eldin,  Anecdote  of,  L,  188 
Clergy,  Catholic  and  Protestant,  i.,  308 
Clive,  Lord,  Royal  Gift  to,  i.,  153 
Clogher,  deposed  Bishop  of,  i.,  290 
Cloncurry,    Lord,    Notice    of,  i.,   147; 

suspected  of  Disaffection,  ii.,  15 
Clonmel,  Lord,  Notice  of,  i.,  151 
Clonmel  Assizes,  ii.,  41 :  Murder  of 
Mr.  Chadwick,  42;  Murder  of  Dan- 
iel Mara,  47  ;  Earl  of  Kingston,  48  ; 
an  Approver,  54 ;  the  Keoghs,  61 ; 
Crime    in    Tipperary,    66  ;     Arthur 
Young  on  Whiteboyism,  67  ;  the  Pe- 
nal  Code,  69 ;    Policy  of  Concilia- 
tion, 74 
Cobbett,  John  Morgan,  ii.,  319 
Cobbett,  William,    sued    and    east   by 
Plunket,  i.,  102  ;  his  History  of  the 
Protestant  Reformation,  ii.,  198;  his 
Career,   3(9;    at  Penenden    Heath, 
320;    Resemblance    to    Sir    Walter 
Scott,  321 
Cockle,   Mr.  Serjeant,  his   Half-Fee, 

ii.,  114 
Coif,  Dignity  of  the,  i.,  174 
Coke,  T.  W.,  of  Norfolk  (Earl  of  Lei- 
cester), ii.,  221 
Colclough,  Caesar,  Epigram  on,  ii.,214 
"  Collegians,  The,"  Origin,  of,  i.,  42 
Colles,  Surgeon,  Notice  of,  i.,  198 
Colonels,  the  Three,  O'Connell's  Epi- 
gram on,  i.,  257 
Combermere,  Lord,  consulted  by  Lord 

Norbury,  ii.,  37 
"  Comical  Miscreant,"Cobbett  so  called 

by  O'Connell,  i.,  284 
Commons,  Irish  House  of,  i.,  130 
Commons,  Nobility  in  the,  ii.,  251 
Compensation    to   Irish   Boroughmon 
gers,  i.,  249 


}§* 


370 


INDEX. 


Confederation,  the  Irish,  i.,  11 
Confessions  of  a  Junior  Barrister, 
ii.,  155  :    Training  for  the  Bar,  15G  ; 
Speech  at  Aggregate  Meeting,  158; 
a  Lawyer  in  Love,  162  ;   a  Double 
Confidant,  165 ;  the  Gain  of  Godli- 
ness, 166  ;  hope  deferred,  167  ;  dan- 
cing into  Practice,  170 
Connaughl,  serving  Writs  in,  i.,  70 
Conyngham,   Marchioness  of,  a  Royal 

Favorite,  i.,  378 
Cooper,  C.  P.,  of  Chancery  Bar,  edits 

Brougham's  Judgments,  ii.,  345 
Coplev,  Sir  John  (see  Lord  Lyndhurst) 
County  J  urines,  Irish,  ii.,  100 
"  Cork  MercssUic  Chronicle,"  i.,  12 
Cork-screw.  She.ii  an  I  the,  i.,  13 
Corawallis,  Lord,  ii  ,  98 
Corporation  of  Dublin  and  Lord  Man- 
ners, ii.,  181 
Coulin,  Singing  of  the,  i.,  296 
Counsel  for  Prisoners,  ii.,  51 
Counsellor,  Title  of,  i.,  29 
Court,  Inns  of,  i.,  28 
Coutts,  Thomas,  his  Wealth,  ii.,  203 
Crampton,  Judge,  Notice  or,  i.,  314 
Crampton,  Sir  Philip,  ii.v  f'6* 
Gran  worth,  Lord-Chnnreilor,  an  Anti- 

Law-Reformer,  ii.,  97 
Cove  of  Cork,  Name  changed,  i.,  22 
Cowley,Cuirun's  nappy  Quotation  from, 

i.,  303 
Croker,  John  Wilson,  i.f  213 
Croly,  satirizes  "  The  Tenth"  in  a  Com- 
edy, i.,  355 
Grotty,  Dr.,  Pres.  <»f  Ma_>nooth,  i.,  383 
Cronan,  Larry,  Trml  of,  i.,  33 
Cumberland,  Dubo  of  (King  of  Hano- 
ver), Grand- Master  of  the  Orange- 
men, i.,  290  ;   heads  the  Brunswick- 
ers,  ii.,  315 
Currc.n,  Jolm  Philpot,  Anecdotes  of,  i., 
63;   Vaned  Powers  67  ;  Defence  of 
the   Shenroses,  99;    his   Opinion    of 
Charles   Phillips,   124;    Description 
of  Lord  Downes,  177  ;  with  Monks 
of  die  Screw,  207  ;  with  Lord  Avon- 
moie  and  a  Dublin  Juiy,  275;   Rec- 
onciliation with  Loi'd  Avonmore,303  ; 
his  Irish  Grave,  354  ;  bon-mot  on  Lord 
Norbury,  ii.,  7  ;  his  Career,  127  ;  de- 
scribed by  iiyron  and  Phillips,  128 ; 
Description  of  Peel,  211 ;  his  Con- 
versation, 216 
f    Tan,  William  Henry,  writes  his  Fa- 
tter's  Life,  ii.,  128 


Curtis,  Archbishop,  Notice  of,  ii.,  386  , 
Correspondence  with  the  Duke  of 
Wellington,  388 

Cutting  and  Maiming,  Ellenborough's 
Act  against,  i.  34 

Darnley,  Eari  of,  ii.,  317 

Dawson,  Alexander,  at  Louth  Election, 
ii.,  235 

Dawson,  George  Robert,  ii.,  32 

Day,  Judge,  at  Killarney,  i.,  301 

Denman,  Lord  Chief-Justice,  his  Inde 
pendence,  ii.,  112;  his  Career,  253 

Derangement  of  the  Mind,  Dr.  Cheyne 
on,  i.,  199 

Deny,  Bishop  of  (Earl  of  Bristol),  i., 
234 

D'Esterre,  Duel  with  O'Connell,  i.,  76 

D'Este,  Sir  Augustus,  ii.,  219 

D'Este,  Mademoiselle,  now  Lady  Tru- 
ro, ii.,  219 

"  Devil,"  the  Judge's,  i.,  228 

Devonshire,  Duke  of,  ii.,  217 

Devonshire,  Georgiana,  Duchess  of, 
ii.,  327 

Dickens,  Charles,  Original  of  his  Ed- 
itor Pott,  ii.,  258 

Dinner-BelL  the  soubriquet  of  Edmund 
Burke,  i.,'  239 

Disraeli,  Benjamin,  his  Character  of 
J.  W.  Croker,  i.,  214 

Dock,  Irish  Criminal,  i.,  31 

Doctors  of  Civil  Law,  Practice  of,  i.. 
174 

Dohert  Y, Chief-Justice,  the  late,  i., 311; 
Promotion,  313  ;  Parliamentary  Con- 
test with  O'Connell,  325  ;  made  Chief 
Justice,  325 ;  Official  Qualifications, 
326  ;  prosecutes  the  Murderers  of 
Daniel  Mara,  ii.,  47  ;  bis  Promotion 
resisted  by  Lord  Manners,  181 

Doneraile  Conspiracy,  i.,  325 

Donoughmore,  Earls  of,  i.,  371 

Donnybrook  Fair,  Decline  and  Fall  of, 
i.,  23 

Downes,  Lord,  i.,  176;  described  by 
Curran,  177 ;  Vice-Chancellor  of 
Trinity  College,  290 

Downing  Street,  London  —  locale  of 
Government  Offices,  i.,  254 

Doyle,  Doctor,  Bishop  of  Kildare  and 
Leighlin,  i.,  318  ;  joins  Catholic  As- 
sociation, 381 ;   Memoir  of,  382 

Doyle,  Sir  John,  Anecdotes  of,  i.,  123 

Drumgoole,  Doctor,  a  Catholic  Leader, 
i.,  374 

Dublin  Castle,  i.,  160 


INDEX. 


m 


Dublin  Election,  in   1803,  L,  270;   in 

1831,  ii.,  357 
"  Dublin  Evening  Mail,"  ii.,  176 
"  Dublin  Evening  Post,"  i.  354  ;  pros- 
ecuted by  Government,  372 
Dublin,  Four  Courts  in  i.,  58 
Dublin,  State  of  Parties  in,  ii.,  354 
Dublin  Tabinet  Ball,  i.,  328;  Ori- 
gin  of,  329  :    Beauty  at,  331  ;   Lord 
and  Lady  Wellosluy  at,  335 ;  Sir  Har- 
eourt  Lees  at,  340  ;  Duke  and  Duch- 
ess of  Loiurter  at,  350  ;  the  Younger 
Grattun  at,  352;   Officers   of  "The 
Tenth"  at,  355;   Miss  O'Oonnell  at, 
357 
Dublin  Theatre,  "  Bottle  Riot,"  i.,  206, 

2:9 

"  Dublin  University  Magazine" on  Plun- 
ket  and  Emmett,  i.,  103 

"Dublin  Warder,"  i.,  340 

"  Dublin  Weekly  Register,"  ii.,  118 

Dudley,  Sir  Henry  Bate,  i.,  294 

Duelling  in  Dublin,  i.,  69  ;  at  the  Bar, 
153;  Lord  Norbury's,  ii.,  6  ;  Extinc- 
tion of,  268 

Duffy,  Mr.,  Editor  of  "The  Nation," 
ii.,  118 

Duigenan,  Dr.,  Notice  of,  i.,  78 

Dumforiine,  Lord  (see  Abercrombie). 

Dunleary,  Name  changed  to  Kingston, 
i.,  80 

Durham,  Earl  of,  ii.,  218 

Dying  Declarations  of  Criminals,  i.,  55 

Edgeworth,  Miss,  the  Irish  Novelist, 
i.,  91 

"  Edinburgh  Review,"  Macaulay  a  Con- 
tributor to,  i.,  213 ;  how  founded, 
ii.,  346- 

Education  in  Ireland,  i.,221  ;  too  pros- 
elyting, 223 

Eldin,  Lord,  Anecdote  of,  i.,  188 

Eldon,  Lord,  his  Career,  i.,  104;  An- 
ecdote of,  188 ;  his  Chancery  De- 
lays, ii.,  97 

Elections,  Duration  of,  ii.,  293 

Elective  Franchise  granted  to  the  Cath- 
olics, i.,  368 

Ellenborough,  Lord,  his  Act,  i.,  34; 
Partisanship  on  Hone's  Trial,  ii.,  112 

Ellis,  Master  in  Chancery,  M.  P.  for 
Dublin,  i.,  261 ;  how  elected,  352 

Eloquence,  Character  of  O'Connell's, 
i.,  221 

Elrington,  Bishop,  i.,  287-;  suppresses 
the  Historical  Society,  and  denoun- 
ces Books  of  Necromancy,  290 


Embassies  to  China,  Cost  of,  i.,  183 

Emmett,  Robert,  Trial  and  Defence  of, 
i.,  100;  Plunket's  Speech  against, 
101 ;  Reproof  to  Lord  Norbury,  ii.,  15 

Emmett,  Temple,  his  brief  Career,  i., 
100 

Emmett,  Thomas  Addis,  Notice  of,  i., 
100 

England  and  Ireland  compared,  ii.,  200 

England,  Bishop,  ii.,  213 

English  Judicature,  i.,  174 

English  Law  in  Ireland,  i.,  58 

Equity  Judges,  ii.,  97 

Errol,  Earl  of,  ii.,  347 

Erskine,  Lord-Chancellor,  i.,  139 

Esmonde,  Sir  Thomas,  ii.,  196 

Ex-Chancellors,  hear  Appeals  as  Law- 
Lords,  i.,  175 

Executions  in  Ireland,  i.,  53 

Falstaff,  a  Legal  (Bumbo  Green),  ii., 
109 

Farnham,  Lord,  ii.,  351 

Fauntleroy,  Henry,  Doubts  of  his  Exe- 
cution, i.,  57 

Fees,  Lawyers',  i.,  19  ;  Anecdotes  of, 
ii.,  114 

Fermoy,  Magistrates  at,  ii.,  178 

"  Fighting  Fitzgerald,"  ii.,  6 

Fingal,  Rail  of,  i.,  373  ;  Notice  of,  ii,, 
102;  Chairman  of  Aggregate  Meet 
ing,  158 

Fitzgerald,  the  Approver,  ii.,  54 

Fitzgerald,  Lord  Edward,  i.,  344  ;  Me- 
moir of,  345 

Fitzgerald,  Sir  Augustus,  ii.,  289 

Fitzgerald,  Prime  Sergeant,  his  Nation- 
ality and  Death,  ii.,  290 

Fitzgerald,  W.  Vesey  (Lord  Fitzgerald 
and  Vesci),  opposed  at  Clare  Elec- 
tion, ii.,  266  ;  Notice  of,  271  ;  Hust- 
ings Speech  at  Clare,  290 ;  Defeat, 
302 

Fitzgibbon  (Earl  of  Clare),  Notice  of, 
i.,  67 

Fitzgibbon,  Mi'.,  and  the  Small  Fee. 
ii.~,  114 

Fitzherbert,  Mrs.,  and  George  IV.,  ii., 
35 

Fitzpatrick,  General,  on  Burke,  i.,239 

Fitzwilliam,  Earl,  Notice  of,  i.,  240  ;  at 
Norfolk  House,  ii.,  226 

Fletcher,  Mr.  Justice,  ii.,  29  ;  his  angry 
Vibrations,  30 

Flood,  Sir  Frederick,  ii.,  7 

Flood,  Henry,  in  the  British  Parbn 
ment,  i.,  113 


m 


M)Ei. 


Follet,  Sir  William,  on  Lawyers'  Prac- 
tice, i.,  188 

Foote,  Maria,  Marriage  with  the  Earl 
of  Harrington,  i.,  350 

Foreign  Titles  held  by  British  Subjects, 
i.,  331 

Fortescue,  Mr.,  Defeat  of,  at  Louth, 
248 

Foster,  John  Leslie,  at  Louth  Elec- 
tion, ii.,  236  ;  the  Nomination,  241 ; 
in  Parliament,  250  ;  Incidents  of  bis 
Life,  254  ;  bis  Appointments,  260  ; 
On  Education  Inquiry,  260  ;  Counsel 
to  Customs  and  Excise,  a  Job,  264 

Four  Courts,  Dublin,  i.,  18,  and  58 

Fox,  Charles  James,  De.^th  of,  i.,  323  ; 
his  Career,  ii.,  228 

Francis,  Sir  Philip,  on  Burke's  Pen- 
sion, i.,  239 

Freeman,  Henry  Deane,  Assistant  Bar- 
rister, ii.,  100 

Freemasons'  Hall,  Catholic  Meeting  in, 
ii.,  220 

Free  Trade,  Peel's  System  of,  ii.,  215 

French  Bar,  the,  i.,  194 

French,  Counsellor,  ii.,  323 

French,  Lord,  Description  of,  i.,  373 

Fuller,  Jack,  a  Parliamentary  Joker, 
ii.,  7 

Gallantly,  Criminal,  i.,  40 

George  III.,  his  Present  to  Lord  Clive, 
i.,  153  ;  opposes  Catholic  Emancipa- 
tion, i.,  367 

George  IV. ,  Visit  to .  Ireland,  i.,  18; 
retains  Anti-Catholic  Ministers,  371 ; 
Reception  in  Ireland,  377  ;  Byron's 
Satire  upon,  379 

Geraldines,  Heir  of  the,  i..  343 

German  Prince,  Tour  of  a,  ii.,  291 

GifFord,  John,  denounced  by  Grattan, 
i.,  270 

Gladstone,  William  Ewart,  at  Oxford, 
ii.,  193 

Glascot,  Toby,  an  Election  Candidate, 
ii.,  263 

:'  Glorious,  pious,  and  immortal  Mem- 
ory," ii.,  132  ' 

Godwin,  William,  Notice  of,  ii.,  122 

Goldsmith,  Oliver,  his  Description  of 
Burke,  i.,  239 

Goold,  Mr.  Sergeant,  Sketch  of,  an 
Admirable  Criehton,i.,  232;  his  Ex- 
travagancfi,  233 ;  goes  to  the  Bar,  235; 
his  Advancement,  242;  Nisi-Prius 
Practice,  242  ;  his  inordinate  Vanity, 
243 ;    Influence    with   Juries,   244 ; 


charged  \\  ilh  Prevarication  beforu 
Limerick  Election  Committee,  250  ; 
defended  by  Grattan,  251 

Gordon,  Duchess  of,  i.,  212 

Gore,  Mr.,  the  Cromwellian,  ii,  291 

Goulburn,  Henry,  Notice  of,  i.,  95  ;  de- 
fends Saurin's  Letter,  ii.,  36 

Gorman,  William,  and  "  The  Burning 
of  the  Sheas,"  ii.,  138 

Gorman&tov'n,  Lord,  joins  the  Catholic 
Association,  i.,  380 ;  Notice  of  ii., 
102 

Grace,  Patrick,  Trial  of,  ii.,  44 

Grady,  Ha  try  Deane,  i.,  26 ;  his  Jury- 
Eye,  141 ;  his  Cross-Examination, 
ii.,  22 

Grattan,  Henry,  Notice  of,  i.,  12  4; 
Moore's  Lines  on,  115  ;  his  Opinion 
of  Buike,  238  ;  of  Goold's  Integrity, 
251  ;  his  later  Unpopularity,  270  ; 
last  Public  Appearance,  282  ;  Burial- 
place,  354  ;  his  Conversation,  ii., 216 

Grattan,  Henry  junior,  i.,  352  ;  at  Tab- 
inet  Ball,  355 

Green,  Bumbo,  ii.,  108 

Gregory,  Dr.  Tighe,  ii.,  183 

Gregory,  Under  Secretary,  ii.,  36 ;  out 
of  Office,  356 

Grenville,  Lord,  and  Catholic  Emanci- 
pation, i.,  367 

Grey,  Earl,  Memoir  of,  ii.,  227  ;  his 
Aristocratic  Pride,  229 

Grey,  List,  the,  ii.,  227 

Griffin,  Gerald,  Irish  Novelist,  Origin 
of  his  "  Collegians,"  i.,  42 ;  his  Omis- 
sions, ii.,  365 

Grimaldi,  Joseph,  the  Pantomimist,  ii., 
32 

Guillamore,  Viscount  (see  O'Grady). 

Gurney,  Sir  John,  "  the  Hanging. 
Judge,"  ii.,  340 

Hamilton,  Gerard,  Opinion  of  Burke 
i.,  238 

Hanlon,  Ellen,  Murder  of,  i.,  42 

"  Hannibals,  the  Father  of  the,"  i.,  102 

Hardwicke,  Lord-Chancellor,  i.,  104: 
Notice  of,  317 

Hard\vi:;ke,  Earl  of,  his  Viceroyalty, 
i.,  370 

Harlowe,  G.  H.,  the  Painter,  Notice 
of,  i.,  91 

Harrington,  Dowager-Countess  of  ( Ma- 
ria Foote,  the  Actress),  i.,  350 

Harrington,  Earls  of,  i.,  350 

Hart,  Sir  Anthony,  Chancellor  of  Ire- 

j     land,  ii.,  174;  on  the  Bench,  359 


iN-Drti. 


Harty   Sir  i?.bert,  Lord-Mayor  of  Drb- 

lin,  ii.,  357 
Hatherton    Lady,  Beauty  of,  i.,  332 
Harvqg',  Bagenal,  Execution  of,  i.,  192 
Henchy,  Peter  Fitzgibbon,  ii.,  121 
Hertford,  Lady,  her  "  Fatal  Witchery" 

of  George  IV.,  i.,  371 
Horvey,  Lord,  Pope's  Satire  on,  i.,  234 
Hessians,  the,  in  Ireland,  i.,  155 
Hill,  Sir  George,  and  Wolfe  Tone,  ii., 

31 

Hincks,  Francis,  his  Education,  ii.,  48 

Historical     Society,    Dublin,    i.,    123 ; 

Bushe's  Speech  in,  124  ;   School  of 

Oratory,  253  ;   suppressed  by  Provost 

Elrington,  290 

Hogan,  Matthew,   Mr.  Shed's  Speech 

on,  ii.,  150 
Hohenloe,  Prince,  reputed  Miracles  by, 

i.,  310 
Holmes,   Robert,  Father  of  the   Irish 

Bar,  i.,  313 
Holycross,  Abbey  of,  ii.,  44 
Honors,  English,  held  by  Irish  Peers, 

i.,  159 
Hope,  Mr.,  and  Lord  Norbury,  i.,  170 
Hope,  Thomas,    Author    of   "  Anasta- 

tius,"  i.,  211 
Horton,  Sir  Robert,  Wilmot,  ii.,  104 
Huguenots  in  Ireland,  i.,  167 
Hume,  Joseph,  Notice  of,  ii.,  217 
Hunt,  Henry,  Notice  of,  ii.,  322 
Hussey,  Peter  Bodkin,  a  Catholic  Lead- 
er, i.,  376 
Hutchinson,  Provost,  and  his    Family, 

i.,  371 
Informers,  Cumin  on,  i.,  24 
Inglis.  Sir  Robert  Harry,  his  Intoler- 
ance, ii.,  193 
Innoshowen,  why  so  called,  i.,  70 
Inns  of  Court,  i.,  28 
Ireland,  Education  in,  i.,  221 

South  of,  i.,  20 

Travelling  in,  i.,  21 

" Young,"  i.,  369 

Irish  Bar,  Independence  of,  i.,68;  Fa- 
ther of  the,  313 
"  Irish  Blackguard,"  Origin  of,  i.,  308 
Irish  Circuit,  an,  i.,  19 
Confederation  formed,  i.,  11 

Deputies,  Napoleon  on,  ii.,  206 

Judges,  Character  of,  ii.,  112 

Judicature,  i.,  174 

Peers,  in  the  British  Parliament, 

i.,  159 
— —  Roads,  ii.,  181 


Ttish  Sabbath,  i.,  290 

Volunteers,  i.,  363 

J.  K.  L.,  Signature  of  Dr.  Doyle,  i  ,  318 

Jackson,  Devonshire,  an  Irish  J  idge, 
ii.,  76 

Jackson,  Rev.  William,  his  Death,  ana 
Refusal  to  escape,  ii.,  235 

Jail-Delivery,  i.,  33 

Jeffrey,  Lord,  Notice  of,  ii.,  346 

Jesuits  and  Lord  Manners,  ii.,  187 

Jocelvn,  Percy,  Deposed  Bishop  of 
Clogber,  i.,  290 

Jocelyn,  Viscount,  ii.,  237 

Johnson,  Dr.,  Opinion  of  Burke,  i.,  238 

Johnston  ("  Bitter  Bob")  and  Pluuket, 
i.,  113 

Johnson,  Judge  Robert,  convicted  of 
Libel,  i.,  303 

Johnson,  Mr.  Justice  William,  at  Wex- 
ford Assizes,  i.,  299  ;  Antipathy  to 
Lord  Norbury,  ii.,  30 

Jones,  John  Gale,  Notice  of,  ii.,  156 

Joy,  Chief-Baron,  i.,  170:  his  Tory 
Politics,  173  ;  Promotion  as  Solicitor- 
General,  179;  Legal  Ability,  180; 
Scientific  Pursuits,  181 ;  as  Chief- 
Baron,  185 

Memoir  of,  i.,  170 

Valedictory  to  Lord  Manners,  ii. 

157 

Judges,  Equity,  Number  of,  ii.,  1/ 

Judges'  Salaries,  Pensions,   and   Life- 
Appointments,  i.,  175,  and  ii.,  111 
Partisanship  in  Ireland,  312 

Judge's  "  Devil,*  i.,  228 

Judicature  in  Great  Britain  and  Ire- 
land, i.,  174;   System  of,  ii.,  Ill 

Jury,  Curran  and  a  Dublin,  i.,  274 

"  Juverna,"  Letters  of,  by  Judge  R. 
Johnson  ;  prosecuted  as  libellous,  303 

Keller,  Jerry,  i.,  207  ;    Bon-mots,  208 

Kcnmare,  Lord,  i.,  380 ;  Notice  of, 
ii.,  102 

Kenny,  Rev.  Mr.,  Provincial  of  the  Jes 
nits,  ii.,  262 

Kent,  Chancellor,  and  Thomas  A  i's 
Emmett,  i  ,  100 

Kent  County  Meeting,  ii.,  315 

Kentish  Men,  ii.,  316 

"  Kent,  Men  of,"  ii.,  316 

Keogh,  John,  a  Catholic  Leader,  i., 
363  ;  his  Career,  366  ;  opposed  by 
O'Connell,  368 

Keoghs,  Trial  of  the,  ii.,  61 

Kildare  Street  Association,  i.,  220'. 
Meetings,  223 


374 


ItfDEX. 


Killarney,  Lakes  of,  i.,  301 

Killeen,  Lord,  a  Catholic  Leader,  i., 
380;  Notice  of,  ii.,  102 

ifilmurry,  the  Seat  of  Chai'Jes  Ka/.dal 
Bushr,  i.,  300 

Ki  I  Warden,  Lord,  killed  by  Mistake  for 
Lord  Carleton,  ik,  19 

King,  Sir  Abraham  Bradley,  ii.,  183 

King-,  Dr.  William j  Archbishop  of  Dub- 
lin, ii.,  77 

King's  Counsel,  Privileges  of,  i.,  320; 
Partisanship  in  appointing,  i.,  321 

Kingsborough,  Viscount,  his  *'  Antiqui- 
ties of  Mexico,"  ii.,  49 

Kingston,  Earl  of,  ii.,  48 

Kirvvan,  Mr.,  Prosecution  of,  i,  377 

Kmitehbull,  Sir  Edward,  ii.,  335 

Ko-tou,  Chinese  Ceremony  of,  i.,  183 

Lacy,  Patrick,  Trial  of,  ii.,  47 

Ladies  in  Court,  i.,  40 

Latouehe,  J.  D.,  Banker  in  Dublin,!.,  94 

Law-Lords  in  Parliament,  i.,  175 

Law  Reforms,  by  Peel,  i.,  327  ;  by 
Brougham,  ii.,  97 

Lawless,  "  Honest  Jack,"  ii.,  276 

Laws,  Penal,  extended,  i.,  361  ;  re- 
laxed, 362 

Lawyer,  Life  of  an  Eminent,  i.,  196; 
a  Saintly,  217;  a  Perfect,  311;  in 
Love,  ii.,  162 

Lawyers,  the  Yelverton,  i.,  205 

Leaders,  Catholic,  Sketch  of,  i.,  359 

Lees,  Sir  rlarcourt,  Memoir  of,  i.,  340  ; 
his  Person  and  Attire,  341  ;  at  the 
Tabinet  Ball,  342    * 

Lkfroy,  Chief-Justice,  i.,  216:  a 
Saintly  Lawyer,  217;  Kildare-Street 
Meetings,  223  ;  in  Court  of  Chance- 
ly,  226  ;  Merit  as  an  Advocate,  227  ; 
his  Promotion,  229 

Legal  Cavalcade,  i  ,  27 

Leicester.  Earl  of  (Thomas  W.  Coke), 
ii.,  211 

Lemsier  Circuit,  i.,  287  ;  Bushe's  At- 
tachment to,  301 

T.*uast'-y,  Duchess  of,  i.,  350 

Leinstor,  Duke  of,  Notice  of,  i.,  343  ; 
Want  of  Nationality,  347  ;  his  Pur- 
suits, 349 

Leinster,  Mount,  in  Wexford,  i.,  295 

Leopold,  Prince,  a  Serene  Highness, 
ii.,  27 

Lethbridge,  Sir  Thomas,  ii.,  262 

"L'Etoile,"  a  Parisian  Journal,  Mr. 
Sheil's  Contributions  to,  ii.,  83 

Liberators,  Order  of,  i:...  2SQ 


License  of  the  Gar'}  i  ,  277 

Life-Appointment  ot   judges,  i.,  if  & 

Liffeyj  a  Dip  in  the,  i.,  63 

Limerick  Assizes,  h,  51  }  Special  Com 
mission,  229 

Limerick,  Treaty  of,  ii.,  80 ;  British 
Violation  of,  81 

Liston,  John,  the  Comedian,  i.,  3  13 

Liverpool,  Ear!  of,  an  Incompetent 
Prime  Minister,  i.,  322 ;  oppose h 
Emancipation,  ii.,  206 

Locke,  John,  his  Treatise  on  Govern- 
ment excluded  from  Dublin  Univer- 
sity Course,  i.,  254 

Londonderry, Marquis  of(Castlereagh), 
i.,  131 

Long  Orchard,  the  Burial-place  of  Mr. 
Sheil,  i.,  11 

Lord-Chancellor's  Salary  and  Pension, 
i.,  175 

Lords,  House  of,  highest  Court  of  Ju- 
dicature, i.,  175 

Louth  Election  in  1826,  ii.,  236 

Lundifoot,  the  Dublin  Tobacconist,  i., 
308 

Lyndhurst,  Lord-Chancellor,  ii.,  340 

Macartney,  Lord,  his  Embassy  to  China, 
i.,  183 

M'Cleary,  David,  ii.,  183 

M'Cleland,  Judge,  Forbearance  on  Em- 
mett's  Trial,  i.,  103 

M'Cormick,  Tobv,  and  Lord  Norbury, 
ii.,  25 

MacDonnell,  ./Eneas,  conducts  a  Cath 
olic    Journal,  i.,  370 ;    Account    of, 
ii.,  202 

MacDonald,  Sir  A.,  Use  of  Epithets  in 
Parliament,  ii.,  292 

"  MacDougall  of  the  Roar,"  i.,  200 

M'Dowall's  Statue  of  Sir  M.  O'Logh- 
lin,  ii.,  116 

M'Kenny,  Sir  Thomas,  presides  at  tho 
Dublin  Catholic  Meeting,  i.,  281 

Mackenzie,  Dr.  Shelton,  Memoir  of 
Sheil  by,  i.,  5  ;   Notes  by,  passim. 

Mackintosh,  Sir  James,  on  Plunket, 
i.,  Ill 

M'Mahon,  Mr.,  a  Pauper  Barrister, 
i.,  91 

MacMahon,  Sir  William,  Master  of  the 
Rolls,  ii.,  105  ;  Dispute  with  Sir  An- 
thony Hart,  ii.,  358 

M'Namara,  Major,  ii.,  267  ;  his  Char- 
acter, 268 

MacNaliy,  Leonard,  and  his  Book,  ii, 
295 


INDEX. 


OlD 


Magee,  Jok*.  Editor  of  the  "Dublin 
Evening  Post,"  i.,  372 

Magee,  Dr.  William,  Archbishop  of 
Dublin,  i.,  283;  officiates  at  Lord 
Wellesley's  Marriage,  335;  compared 
with  Archbishop  King,  ii.,  77 

Magrath,  Counsellor,  great  Length  of, 
i.,  155  ;  Moore's  Question  to,  156 

Maguire.  Rev.  Thomas,  ii.,  277  ;  Me- 
moir of,  278;  at  Clare  Election, 
279 

Mahoii,  O'Gorman,  ii.,  269  ;  Notice  of, 
274;  wears  the  Order  of  Liberators' 
Sash  and  Medal,  285  ;  proposes  0'- 
Connell  at  Clare,  289 

Mahony,  Darby,  and  Lord  Norbury, 
ii,  1*7 

Ma.vnkrs,  Loud,  bis  Family  Connec- 
tions, i.,  191  ;  Judicial  Inefficiency, 
315;  Partisanship,  320  ;  retires  from 
Office,  ii.  5 

Sketch  of,  ii.,  172 

Takes  Leave  of  Irish  Bar,  172 

Joy's  Valedictory  to,  175 

Sfieil's  Opinion  o,,  177 

Manners  Testimony  t,  ii.,  185 

Mara  Family,  the  Conspiracy  against, 
ii.,  46 

Mara,  Daniel,  Trial  of  his  Murderers, 
ii.,  17 

Mara,  Philip,  Witness  on  a  Murder- 
Trial  ii,  14 

Marriage  out  of  the  Dock,  i.,  41 

Marriages,  Catholic,  ii.,  95 

Martin,  of  Connemara,  i,  166  ;  his  Suc- 
cessors, 166 

Martin,  Mrs.  Bell,  her  Death  in  New 
York,  i,  166 

Martin,  Richard,  of  the  English  and 
Irish  Bar,  ii,  100 

Maturin,  his  Opinion  of  Mrs.  Siddons, 
ii,  218 

Mayne, Judge,  and  Jerry  Keller,  i,  208; 
hit,  imposing  Gravity,  ii,  27 

Mayni.oth,  College  of,  i,  221 

Meagher,  Thomas  Francis,  i,  369 

Mellon,  Harriet,  her  Husbands  and 
Wealth,  ii,  203 

"  Mem!>>r  for  all  Ireland,"  i,  257 

Messiah  of  Royalty,  Byron's,  i,  379 

Metrup  ».il:m  Magazine,  i,  14  ;  Sketch- 
es fio'v,  ii,  340  and  354 

Milbankc,  Sir  John  Peneston,  it.,  348 

Milbo  jrne-Port.  Borough  of,  represent- 
ed by  Mr.  North  and  Mr.  Sheil,  i, 
255 


Mills,  Harry,  at  Loutb  Election,  ii,  243 

Milner,  Bishop,  Visit  to,  ii,  195 

Mind,  Dr.  Cheyne  on  Derangement  of 
the,  i,  199 

Mitchell,  John,  Irish  Patriot,  i,  369  : 
Editor  of  *'  The  United  Irishman," 
ii,  118 

Monks  of  the  Screw,  their  Charter- 
Song,  i,  206 

Monomania,  Father  Carroll's,  i,  305  ; 
fatal  Effects  of,  307 

Monster  Meetings,  ii,  280 

Moore,  George  Ogle,  a  Candidate  at 
Dublin,  ii,  357 

Moore,  Judge,  ii,  31 ;  at  Clonmei  As- 
sizes, 48;  his  Character,  123 

Moore,  Thomas,  on  Captain  Rock,  i.. 
39;  on  Sheridan,  138;  on  Richarc 
Martin,  166  ;  his  Birth,  208  ;  on  Speii 
ce~  Perceval,  289  ;  where  born,  296  : 
on  Duke  of  York,  ii,  207  ;  on  Lord 
Anglesey,  250  ;   on  Wellington,  308 

Morgan,  Lady,  i,  351 

"  Morning  Chronicle,"'  London  News- 
paper, I.,  39 

Mornington,  Countess  of,  Mother  of 
four  Peers,  i,  336 

Mornington,  Earl  of,  i.,  95 

Mountain-Dew,  i,  70 

Mountain-Peasantry  in  Court,  i,  30 

Murder  on  the  Shannon,  i,  42 

Munstor  Circuit,  i,  35 

Murphy,  Father,  of  Corofin,ii,  281  ;  his 
Speech  in  Irish,  282  ;  his  Vigilance, 
302 

Murray,  Dr.,  Archbishop  of  Dublin, 
i,  387 

Murray,  Lady  Augusta,  ii,  219 

Muskau,  Prince  Puckler,  on  O'Con- 
ueiJ,  ii,  291 

Napoleon  on  Chinese  Embassy,  i,  183  ; 
retains  Napper  Tandy,  ii,  9  ;  Opin- 
ion of  Irish  Deputies,  206 

"  Nation,  The,"  Dublin  Repeal  Jour- 
nal, ii.,  118 

National  Debt,  how  increased,  i.,  240 

National  Education  in  Ireland,  i.,  221 

"  New  Monthly  Magazine,"  i,  12 

Nisi-Prius  Practice,  i,  29 

Nobility  in  House  of  Commons,  ii,  251 

Norbury,  Lord,  S'Keteh  of,  ii,  5: — 
called  to  the  Bar,  7  ;  fights  his  Way 
on,  9  ;  as  Solicitor-General,  13  ;  Cru- 
elty in  the  Sheareses  Case,  1 4 ;  Harsh- 
ness to  Robert  Emmett,  15  ;  Judicial 
Brutality,   17  ;    Buffo  Scenes  in    nia 


-376 


INDEX 


Court,  31 ;  his  Jests,  26  ;  violent  As- 
cendency Politics  ;  the  Saurin  Letter, 
33;    Negotiations    for    Resignation, 
36;    Consulting-  a   Friend   in   India, 
3/  ;  his  Library,  39 
Norcott,  the  Barrister,   turns  Moham- 
medan, i.,  214;  his  Fate,  215 
Norfolk,  Duke  of,  ii.,  220 
Norfolk  House,  Dinner  at,  ii.,224 
North,    John    H.,    Admiralty  Judge, 
Sketch  of,  i.,  252  :   his  Career,  252  ; 
Bar  Progress,  256  ;  compai-ative  Fail- 
ure as  a  Senator,  261 ;  his  Exterior, 
262  ;  Political  Neutrality,  263  ;  Dub- 
Jin  Theatre  "  Bottle  Riot,"  266  ;  at 
Louth  Election,  ii.,  241 
Morton,  Sir  Fletcher,  Abuse  of,  ii.,  292 
Nugent,  Lord,  satirized  by  Canning,  ii., 

208 ;  Notice  of,  352 
O'Brien,   Sir  Edwaid,  at  Clare  Elec- 
tion, ii.,  280 
O'Brien,    William    Smith,  Memoir  of, 

ii.,  28?  ;  his  Penal  Exile,  288 
O'Connell,  Daniel,  his  Success  with 
Juries,  i.,  35  ;  Sketch  of,  i.,  73  ;  his 
Versatility,  74  ;  Memoir  of,  75  ;  his 
Property,  77 ;  Merits  as  a  Lawyer, 
78;  a  Tribune  of  the  People,  81; 
Demeanor  in  Court,  82 ;  Defence 
of  Criminals,  86 ;  Duel  with  D'Es- 
terre,  89  ;  after  Clare  Election,  90  ; 
On  Circuit,  and  as  a  Public  Speaker, 
93  ;  in  Parilament,  94 — and  before 
the  Privy  Council,  95 

Patent  of  Precedency  to,  i.,  174 

At  Kildare-Street  Meeting,  223 

Versatility   as    a    Speaker,   257 ; 

Entrance  into  Wexford,  297 ;  Par- 
liamentary Contest,  Mi-.  Doherty, 
325  ;  Entrance  into  Public  Life,  368  ; 
his  Struggles,  "  within  the  Law,", 
for  Emancipation  and  Repeal,  369  ; 
on  the  King's  Visit,  drinks  the  Or- 
ange Charter  Toast,  378  ;  founds  the 
Catholic  Association,  379  ;  his  Man- 
ner of  Speaking  in  Public,  381  ;  his 
Costume  at  the  Assizes,  ii.,  107 

At  Aggregate  Meeting,  ii.,  159 

En  Route  to  London,  ii.,  194 

Visits  Dr.  Milner,  ii.,  196 ;  visits. 

die  House  of  Commons,  ii.,  207 

Challenged  by  Peel,  ii.,  213 

— —  Bushe'a  Epigram  on,  ii.,  213 

Character  of  his  Eloquence,  ii., 

221;  Speech  in  Freemasons'  Hall, 
221;  baffles  the  Reporters  by  a  Speech 


in  Irish,  280 ;  a  Man  of  the  People 
291 ;    Elected   for  Clare,  302  ;   and 
Re-Election,  303 
O'Connell,  Maurice,  Death  of,  i.,  77 
O'Connell,  Miss,  at  the  Tabinet  Ball, 

i.,  357 
O'Gorman,    Nicholas    Purcel,   Keller's 
Retort  to,  i.,  209  :  his  Habiliments, 
ii.,  120-   Visit  to  London,  207  ;   aft- 
pointed  Cursitor,  355 
O'Grady,    Chief-Baron    (Lord    Guilla- 
more),  i.,  135  ;  Anecdotes  of,  ii.,  1 13 
O'Hanlon,  Mr.,  Speech  by,  ii.,  223 
O'Leary,  Joseph,  Jr^h  Lyrist,  i.,  13 
O'Loghlin,  Sir  Coleman,  Irish  Barris- 
ter, ii.,  116 
O'Loghlin,  Sir  Michael  (Master  of 
the   Rolls),  Sketch  of:   Person,  De- 
portment, and  Descent,  ii.,  106  ;  Cir- 
cuit Costume,  107  ;  his  Mastery  of 
"Practice,"  111;   Memoir  of,   116; 
his  Promotions,  116;  his  Danish  An- 
cestor, 117;  Statue  of,  in  the  Four 
Courts,  ii.,  116  • 

O'Meagher,  J.  B.,  Paris  Correspondent 

of  "The  Times,"  i.,  13 
Orange  Toast,  ii.,  132 
Oratory,  Specimen  of  Forensic,  ii.,  15? 
O'Regan,  Counsellor,  his  Life  of  J.  P. 

Curran,  ii.,  128 
Oriel,  Lord,  Notice  of,  ii.,  248 
Ormsby,  Sir  Charles,  and  Mr.  Sergeant 

Goolrl,  i.,  241 
Oxford  University,  Representation,  ii., 

193 
Palmer,  Lady,  Interview  with,  ii.,  88 
Parliamentary  Billingsgate,  ii.,  292 
Parliamentary   Reform,  when   carried, 

ii.,  227 
Patent  of  Precedency,  i.,  174 
Peel,  Sir  Robert:  his  Business  Habits 
and  Law  Reforms,  i.,  327  ;  defends 
the    Saurin   Letter,  ii.,  34 ;    defends 
Lord  Norbury,   37  ;   his  Early   Dis- 
tinctions,   193 ;    desci'ibed    by   Cur- 
ran, 241 ;  Attack  on  Hamilton  Row- 
an, 211 ;    his    Oratory  and  Appear- 
ance, 212  ;  his  Challenge  to  O'Con 
nell,  213;  Memoir  of,  215 
Peer,  Cost  of  making  a,  ii.,  249 
Peerage  of  Ireland,  degraded  by  the 

Union,  i.,  159 
Penal  Laws,  Extension  of,  i.,  361 ;  Op- 
eration of,  ii.,  69  ;  first  Link  of,  8}  ; 
denounced   by   Sir   T.    Butler,    83 
Enactments  ef,  87 


INDEX. 


3f? 


Penenden  Heath  Meeting,  ii.,  315  : 
The  Gathering,  316;  the  Peers  and 
the  People,  318;  William  Cobbett, 
319;  Henry  Hunt,  322',  Lord  Win- 
chilsea  and  the  Brunswickers,  325  ; 
Shell's  Unspoken  Speech,  334 

Pennefather,  Edward,  Chief-Justice,  i., 
188 

Pennefather,  Richard,  Baron  of  Ex- 
chequer, i.,  188 

Perceval,  Spencer,  Notice  of,  ii.,  289 

Perjury,  instant  Punishment  of,  i.,  33 

Perrin,  Judge,  Notice  of,  i.,  313  ;  Char- 
acter as  a  Lawyer,  ii.,  362  ;  Private 
History,  364 ;  in  Parliament,  365 

Peterloo  Massacre,  denounced  by  Lord 
Fitzwilliam,  i.,  240 

Phillips,  Charles,  Irish  Orator,  Memoir 
of,  i.,  124 

Phoenix  Park,  Dublin,  ii.,  166 

Physiology  of  Race  in  Ireland,  i.,  166 

Pic-nic  in  the  Woods  of  Wexford,  i., 
295 

Pitt,  William,  and  Catholic  Emancipa- 
tion, i.,  367 

Plowden,  Francis,  the  Irish  Historian, 
ii.,  187 

Plunket,  Lord-Chancellor,  Sketch 
of,  i.,  98;  defends  the  Sheareses,  i., 
99;  opposes  the  Union,  99;  accused 
of  unnecessary  Harshness  to  Robert 
Emmett,  101;  Defence  by  Phillips, 
102  ;  great  Chancery  Practice,  103  ; 
Rationale  of  his  Pleading,  105;  not 
a  Case -Lawyer,  106  ;  his  Rhetoric, 
107;  Description  by  Phillips,  109; 
his  Style,  110;  Brougham's  Opinion 
of,  113;  Success  in  Parliament,  113; 
Advocacy  of  Catholic  Emancipation, 
114;  Anti-Union  Orations,  116;  his 
bon-mots,  117  ;   Memoir  of,  119 

I'luukct,  Margaret,  and  the  Duke  of 
Rutland,  i.,  190 

Pollock,  Sir  Frederick,  ii.,  340 

Pomposo,  Counsellor,  i.,  203 

Ponsonby,  George,  Lord-Chancellor  of 
Ireland,  i.,  129  ;  Lord  Norbury's  At- 
tacks on,  ii.,  12  ;  on  Admission  of 
Catholic  Barristers,  91 

Pope,  Alexander,  Satire  on  Lord  Her- 
vey,  i.,  234 

Potheen,  why  so  called,  i.,  70 

Pre-Audience  at  the  Bar,  ii.,  98 

Precedency,  Patent  of,  i.,  174 

Prendergast,  Mr.,  Registrar  in  Chan- 
cery, i.,  189 


Price,  Dr.,  Notice  of  i.,  236 

Priests,  Exertions  of  ti'ie.  at  Clare  Eleo 
tion,  ii.,  284 

Priestley,  Dr.,  Notice  of,  i.,  217 

"Prince's  Mixture,"  i.,  308 

Prisoners,  Counsel  for,  ii.,  51 

Prisoners"  Gratitude,  Anecdo'.es  of  i. 
37 

Process-Servers,  how  treated,  i.,  71 

Protestant  Ascendency,  Cause  of  Crime 
ii.,  71 ;  what  it  means,  76 

Protestant  Reformation,  Cobbett's  His- 
tory of,  ii..  198 

Protestant  Reformation  Society,  ii.,  199 

Puisne  Judges,  i.,  176 

Qualification  of  Members,  ii.,  274 

"  Quarterly  Review,"  by  whom  estab- 
lished, i.,  213 

Queen's  Counsel  (see  King's  Counsel) 
how  appointed — Precedency — Num- 
bers— Advantages — and  Sil  k-Gowns, 
i.,  174 

Quotations,  Apt,  i.,  257 

Races,  Characteristics  of,  in  Ireland, 
i.,  166 

Radcliffe,  Dr.,  fees  Himself,  i.,  136 

Radnor,  Earl  of,  ii.,  318 

Raglan,  Lord,  Cost  of  his  Patent  ox 
Peerage  ii.,  249 

Rathdown,  Lord,  in  Character,  ii.,  191 

Rebellion  of  1798,  i.,  154 

Redesdale,  Lord-Chancellor,  i.,  227 ; 
his  Successor,  228 

Reflections  on  the  French  Revolution, 
by  Burke,  Royal  Appreciation  of, 
i.,  239 

Reform,  Parliamentary,  when  carried, 
ii.,  227 

Regency,  Burke's  Advocacy  of,  i.,239 

Renegade,  Fate  of  Norcott,  the,  i.,  215 

Rent,  the  Catholic,  ii.,  292 

Repeal  of  the  Union,  O'Conn ell's  Agi- 
tation for,  i.,  369 

Results  of  Clare  Election,  ii.,  266 

Retiring  Pensions  of  the  Judges,  i.:  175 

Revolution  in  Ireland,  Attempt  at,  i.,  11 

Riding-House  in  Dublin,  Tortures  in- 
flicted in,  ii.,  22 

Roche,  Sir  Boy  e,  his  Bulls,  ii.,  10 

Rock,  Captain  Lines  on  by  Moore, 
i.,  39 

Rockingham,  Marquis  oi  brings  Burke 
inta  Parliament,  i.,  23£/ 

Roden,  Earl  of,  ru,  237 

Romilly,  Sir  Samuel,  Notice  of,  i.,  103 

Rosse,  Earls  of,  ii.,  33 


3?8 


IND'^X. 


Rotunda  iu  Dublin,  Public  Meeting-  in, 
:.,  281 ;  Tablet  Ball  in,  i..  330 

Rowan,  Archibald  Hamilton,  at- 
tacked by  Peel,  ii.,  211  ;  described, 
230;  bis  Exile,  and  Pardon,  231; 
bis  Manlj  Appearance,  232  ;  Escape 
from  Prison,  233  ;  Asylum  in  Amer- 
ica, 235 

Royal  Visits  to  Ireland  :  by  Queen  Vic- 
toria, i.,  22  ;  by  George  IV.,  i.,  377 

Russell,  Lord  Jobn,  and  Relief  of  Dis- 
senters' Civil  Disabilities,  ii.,  2G5 

Rutland,  Duke  of,  Vicerov  of  Ireland, 
i.,  190 

Saints,  the  Dublin,  i.,  322 

Saints,  Ireland  the  Island  of,  ii.,  197 

Saints,  the,  in  Parliament,  ii.,  359 

St.  Leonards,  Lord-Chancellor  (Sug- 
den),  i.,  204 

St.  Omer,  O'Connell  educated  at,  i., 
223 

St.  Patrick's  Hull,  in  Dublin  Castle, 
ii.,  220 

Salamanca,  Irish  Disputants  at,  de- 
scribed in  "  Gil  Bias,"  i.,  376 

Salaries  of  the  Judges,  i.,  175 

Sarsfieid,  "  the  Gallant"  Defender  of 
Limerick,  ii.,  80 

Saturday  Night,  the  Lawyer's  Holyday, 
i.,  206 

Saurin,  Attorney-General,  i.,  150  : 
Huguenot  Descent,  150 ;  Business- 
Habits,  153  ;  opposes  the  Union,  157  ; 
made  Attorney-General,  160;  Influ- 
ence with  Lord-Chancellor  Manners, 
160 ;  opposes  the  Catholic  Claims, 
161  ;  refuses  the  Chief-Justiceship, 
is  taken  at  his  Word,  and  loses  Of- 
fice, 163  ;  Deportment  and  Aspect, 
164  ;  Skill  as  an  Advocate,  168  ;  Dis- 
taste for  Literature,  169 

Injudicious  Letter  to  Lord  Nor- 

bury,  ii.,  33 — a  Bar  to  his  Promotion, 
35  ;  Lord  Manners'  Friendship  for, 
173  ;  rebuffed  by  Sir  A.  Hart,  238 
Scanlan,  John,  Trial  of  for  Murder,  i., 
51;  Conviction  and  Execution,  54; 
Popular  Belief  of  his  Escape,  57  ; 
Motivo  and  Malice  prepense  of  his 
Crime  ii.,  365 

Scarlett,  Sir  James  (Lord  Abingcr),  No- 
tice of,  ii.,  36  ;  at  Brougham's  Din- 
ner, 219  ;  at  Brougham's  Levee,  348 

Scott,  Sir  Walter,  describes  Castlereagh 
at  the  Coronation,  ii.,  118;  his  own 
Resemblance  to  Cobbett,  321 


Scottish  Judicature,  i  ,  17  4 
Screw,  Monks  of  the.  i.,  206 
Scriven,  Barclay,  Description  of,  ii.,  122 
Sergeants-at-Law,    in    England — their 
Standing  and  Precedence,  i.,  173 

Sergeauts-at-Law,  in  Ireland,  appoint- 
ed by  the  Crown,  and  their  Prece- 
dence, i.,  173 

Shannon,  Murder  on  the,  i.,  42;  Mo- 
tive of,  ii.,  365 

Shaw,  Frederick,  ii.,  358;  appointed 
Recorder,  360 

Shea,  John  Augustus,  Irish  poet,  i.,  13 

Sheareses,  John  and  Henry,  Trial  of, 
i.,  98;   legal  Murder  of,  99 

Sheas,  Burning  of  the,  ii.,  lo8;  His- 
tory of,  139  ;  Trial  for,  142  ;  Shell's 
Speech  on,  149 

Sheehans,  Editors  of  Dublin  "  Even- 
ning  Mail,"  ii.,  176 

Sheil,  Richard  Lalor,  Memoir  of,  i.,  5 

Shelley,  Mrs.,  Notice  of,  ii.,  122 

Sheridan,  Dr.,  Prosecution  of,  i.,  377 

Sheridan,  Richard  Brinsley,  Notice  of, 
i.,  138  ;  Byron's  and  Moore's  Opinion 
of,  i.,  138;  his  Address  to  the  Prince, 
i.,  371 

Shifnal,  Description  of,  ii.,  201 

Siddons,  Mrs.,  Anecdotes  of,  ii.,  218 

Sidmouth,  Viscount,  Letter  from,  in  the 
King's  Name,  i.,  379  ;  his  Peerage, 
ii.,  352 

Silk-Gowns,  by  whom  worn,  i.,  174  ; 
Partisan  Disposal  of,  ii.,  320 

Singer,  Dr.  J.  H.,  Bishop  of  Meath. 
ii.,  77 

Slaney,  Scenery  on  the  River,  i.,  214 

Smith,  Egerton  (usually  called  "  Bol 
Smith"),  i„  258 

Smith,  S.  Catersca  Irish  Artist,  Por- 
trait of  Sheil  bv    i-a  face — i.,  1 

Smith,  T.  B.  C,  Master  of  the  Rolls, 
ii.,  114 

Smith,  Sir  W.  Cusack,  Notice  of,  ii. 
114 

Smith,  William,  of  Norwich,  ii.,  351 

Smythe,  Hon.  Mr.,  a  "  Young  Eng- 
land" Leader,  ii.,  257 

Sorbonne  Doctors,  Attack  on  Bishop 
Doyle  by,  i.,  383 

Southey,  Robert,  his  Opinion  of  Cob 
bett's  pure  English,  ii.,  319 

Speculative  Society  of  Edinburgh,  i. 
253 

Stanhope,  Colonel  Leicester  (Earl  of 
Harrington),  i.,  350 


INDEX. 


379 


Stale.  Lord  Wellesley's  Viceregal,  i., 
337 

State  of  Parties  in  Dublin:  Mr. 
Bellew  in  "Silk  Attire,"  ii.,  354 ; 
O'Loghlin  and  O'Gorman  promoted, 
355  ;  Dublin  Election :  Moore  and 
Recoider  Shaw  versus  Harty  and 
Perrin,  357  ;  Lord-Chancellor  Hart, 
Mr.  Saurin,  and  the  Master  of  the 
Rolls,  359  ;  Victory  of  the  Liberals, 
366 
Staunton,  Sir  George,  in  the  EmDassy 

to  China,  i.,  183 
Steele,  Thomas,  ii.,  269  ;  sont  to  Clare, 
270  ;   Memoir  of,  272  ;  seconds  Mr. 
.     O-Connell's  Nomination,  289 
Stephen's  Green,  Dublin,  ii.,  181 
Sterne,  Story  of  the  Sword,  i.,  300 
Stothard,Thos.,  and  Chan  trey's  "  Sleep- 
ing Children,"  i.,  332 
Stourton,  Lord,  a  Catholic  Peer,  ii.,  223 
Strangford,  Lord,  ii.,  257 
Stuart,  Villiers,  defeats    Lord  George 

Beresford  at  Waterford,  ii.,  235 
Stuff-Gown,  worn  by  Utter  or  Outer  Bar- 
risters, i.,  174 
Sullivan,  Stephen,  tried  and  convicted 
of  Murder,  i.,  56  ;  his  Confession,  56 
"  Sun,  The,"  London  Newspaper,  i.,  9, 

and  ii.,  331 
Sussex,  Duke  of,  Memoir  of,  ii.,  219 
Sutton, Charles  Manners  (Viscount  Can- 
terbury), Speaker  of  the  House  of 
Commons,  ii.,  207  ;   at   Brougham's 
Levee,  350 
Tabinet  Ball,  the  Dublin,  i,  328 
Tandy,    Napper,   a    United    Irishman, 

ii.,  9 
Taylor,  General  Zachary,  Wellington's 

Opinion  of,  ii.,  309 
"  Tenth,  The,"  Anecdotes  of,  i.,  355 
Terror,  Irish  Reign  of,  ii.,  14 
Test  and   Corporation  Acts  republic, 

ii.,  315 
Teynham,  Lord,  ii.,  333 
Thurlow,  Lord-Chancellor,  i.,  104;  his 

Opinion  of  Burke,  238 
"  Times"  Newspaper,  Influence  of,  i.,  39 
Tinnahinch,  Grattan's  Seat,  i.,  115 
Tipperary,  Crime  in,  ii.,  65  ;  Antiquity 

and  Causes  of,  66 
Toler,  John  (Earl  of  Norbury),  ii.,  5 
Tone,  Theobald  Wolfe,  i.,  363  ;  Secre- 
tary of  the  Catholics,  366  ;  his  Sui- 
cide, ii.,  9 ;   Scene  with  Sir  George 
Hill,  31 ;  his  Eventful  Career,  119 


Torrens,  Judge,  ii.,  31 
Tower  of  London,  ii.,  205 
Toweis,  Dr.,  Notice  of,  i.,  236 
Travelling  in  Ireland,  i.,  287 
Trinity  College,  Dublin,  i.,  288 
Trippier,  the  Parisian  Avocat,  i.,  195 
Troy,  Dr.,  Archbishop  of  Dublin,  i.,  385  , 
his  Poverty,  386 

Truro,  Lord-Chancellor  (Sir  Thomaa 
Wilde),  large  Fee  to,  i.,  19 ;  originally 
an  Attorney,  29 

Union  Debating-Clubs  at  Oxford  and 
Cambridge,  i.,  253 

Union,  the,  opposed  by  Curran.  Plun 
ket,  Fonsonby,  Saurin,  BurroweSj 
Bushe,  and  the  Irish  Par  generally, 
i.,  129 ;  Barrington's  Historic  Me- 
moirs of,  246  ;  how  the  Measure  was 
carried,  248  ;  opposed  by  O'Connell, 
369  ;  obtained  on  broken  Promises, 
ii.,  98 

"  United  Irishman,  the,"  edited  by 
John  Mitchel,  ii.,  118 

Vallancey,  General,  the  Antiquarisn, 
ii.,  260 

"  Vathek,"  Author  of,  i.,  193 

Verdicts,  Strange,  i.,  26 

Vestris,  Madame,  i.,  343 

Vice-Queen,  an  American,  i.,  332 

Victoria,  Queen,  visits  Ireland,  i.,  22 

Vizard,  William,  Attorney  to  Queen 
Caroline,  ii.,    348 

Voltaire,  Notice  of,  i.,  79 

Volunteers,  the  Irish,  i.,  363 

Walker's  "  Hibernian  Magazine,"  ii., 
178 

Wallace, Thomas,]'., 269;  Promotion, 
270;  Liberal  Opinions,  270 ;  Intel- 
lectual Powers,  and  Appearance,  27 1; 
on  Jury-Cases,  274;  Fearlessness  at 
the  Bar,  276  ;  Literary  Taste,  285  ; 
in  Parliament,  286 

V^ftJth  John,  tried  at  Clonmel  Assizes, 
ii.,  47 

War,  Four  Years'  Expenses  of,  ii.,  341 

Warren,  Mr.  Sergeant,  i.,  189 

Waterford  Election,  ii.,  235 

Wellcsley,  Marquis,  why  made  Irish 
Viceroy,  i.,  178  ;  Bottle-Riot  against, 
266  ;  his  Marriage,  334  ;  at  Tabinet 
Ball,  335  ;  Memoir  of,  336  ;  Assump- 
tion of  Regal  State  by,  337 

Wellesley,  Marchioness,  suggests  the 
Tabinet  Ball,  i.,  329 ;  Memoir  of,  332; 
her  reputed  Wealth,  334  ;  her  Per- 
son described,  338  ;  Death  of,  ii.,  3@£ 


380 


INDEX. 


Wellington,  Duke  of,  Epigram  on,  i.,  23; 
Letter  to  Archbishop  Curtis,  i.,  387  ; 
his  Career,  ii.,  308;  imputed  Want 
of  Nationality,  309  ;  at  Lord  Brough- 
am's Levee,  345 
Wetherell,  Sir  Charles,  ii.,  210 
Wexford  Assizes,  Sketch  of,  i.,  287  ; 

Trial  of  Father  Carroll,  304 
Wexford,  old  Monastery  of,  i.,  290 
— —  Peasantry  of,  i.,  292 

Massacre  on  the  Bridge  of,  i.,  297 

O'Connell's  Entrance  into,  i.,  298 

Wbiteboys,  why  so  called,  i.,  39 
Whiteboyism,  how  caused,  ii.,  67 
Whitehall,  London,  Government  Offices 

in,  i.,  254 
Wigs,  Lawyers',  Differences  in,  i.,  174 
Wilde,  Sir  Thomas  (Lord  Truro),  large 

Fee  to,  i.,  19 

Wilkins,  Mr.  Sergeant,  Leader  of  the 

Northern  Circuit  in  England,  i.,  174 

William  III.,  a  Dutch  Adventurer,  i.  88 

Willis,  N.  P.,  his  "  Pencillings  by  the 

Way,"  ii.,  213 
Wilson.  Harriet.,  Notice  of  i.    348 


Wilson,  Sir  Robert,  ii.,  347 

Wilson,  SirT.  M.,  High-Sheriffof  Kent, 
ii.,  326 

Winchilsea,  Earl  of,  ii.,  325;  his  Kent- 
ish Speech,  331 

Windele,  John,  Irish  Antiquarian,  i.,  13 

Windham,  Opinion  of  Burke,  i.,  238 

Wings,  the,  of  Emancipation  Bill,  i., 
7  ;  what  they  were,  ii.,  276 

Wolfe,  Rev.  Charles,  an  Orator  in  the 
Historical  Society,  i..  253 

Wolfe,  Chief-Baron,  Carelessness  of 
Attire,  ii.,  107  ;  his  Career,  119 

Wolstoncroft,  Marv,  Author  of  "  The 
Rights  of  Woman,"  ii.,  122 

Yelverton,  Barry,  his  Career,  i.,  25  : 
Friendship  for  Curran,  303 

Yelverton,  Lawyers,  the,  i.,  205 

York,  Archbishop  of,  ii.,  345 

York,  Duke  of,  Anti-Catholic  Speech 
by,  ii,  207 

Young,  Arthur,  on  Irish  Crime,  ii.,  66 

Young,  Murdo,  of  "  The  Sun"  News- 
paper, ii.,  331 

"  Young  Ireland"  Party  ftnmed,  i.,  $69 


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